I Corinthians 6:19-20 "You are not your own. You were bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and your spirit, which are God's."
I think I may be on social media overload. Okay, not maybe. Probably. But none the less, a few things have my stomach churning. So many issues today that aren’t just political but apply to the moral fiber of our being. My mind can’t even go there this second. My heart breaks knowing the things that my children will be exposed to. I only pray that God will break their hearts for what breaks His.
What I AM going to go there on is a statement made recently by a host for MSNBC, Melissa Harris-Perry. Her exact quote was:
"We have never invested as much in public education as we should have because we've always had kind of a private notion of children. Your kid is yours and totally your responsibility. We haven't had a very collective notion of these are our children, so part of it is we have to break through our kind of private idea that kids belong to their parents, or kids belong to their families, and recognize that kids belong to whole communities.”
This absolutely repulses me. In a society that has taken away any sense of personal responsibility for any action, decision, condition, etc. I guess this is just the next thing to go. (I read another article this week with the basic jist "why is addiction still considered a weakness?" The author was surprised that people "still" equate addiction with poor choices rather than a clinical or genetic disorder. How defeatest can we possibly be?) But our children? So basically, my children were born to be raised by society for the responsibility and greater good of the "community"? And what is the greater good of the community? What purpose does "the community" have for my children? I cannot even fathom the evils that would prevail if my children truly were belonging to the "community". I'm glad that so many people were outraged, and the question was even asked facetiously "who would gladly hand over their parenting responsibilities." I won't answer that since it's way more political than the point I'm trying to make is, but a great number of people gladly will and do in an entitlement society.
The truth is and the whole point of this post is that my children don’t even belong to me. Or my husband. Or our family. Gavin and Harper belong to God. They were only entrusted to Matthew and I for a season to shape and to mold for HIS purpose and glory. I claim in faith that my children were "bought with a price" and intended for His good works. Similar to Hannah's prayer in I Samuel 1:11- totally paraphrased- "if you will give us a child, we will give him to the Lord all the days of his life." That is the RESPONSIBILITY that my husband and I accepted when we were blessed with children and while we may not always or even often get it all right, that's our daily goal: to raise children who will love and serve God with all of their hearts and choose to obey Him.
Do I think this means my kids are going to be perfect? Nope. Does it mean that we're going to be this awesome family that always gets it right, never has a fight or a behavior issue or problem? Not a chance. It's actually kind of hard. Sometimes I have to remind myself that God might not chose for Gavin and Harper to be the next super successful dr or lawyer or the next worship leader or the next amazingly awesome drummer for his (or her!) generations' biggest Christian rock band (who can say we can't dream a little though, right?!). God might have plans for Gavin and Harper that aren't what we would have in mind. And while that's hard to think about and even to type, I believe that God being glorified in their lives is far greater than happiness or success or for my dreams for them to come true could ever be.
I pray that we are doing enough to raise up a generation of Godly boys and girls who will some day be the men and women who take ownership for their faith and their choices and their standards and will not float around in the winds of surrender to culture. I pray that when we look at our children, we would see an responsibility which is far greater than education or society could command. My children belong to Christ.
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