Tag Archives: sons

Day 21: Humility

Encouragement from Brooke: I chose humility as our last day’s topic because it is such an amazing posture of the heart. Scripture just seems to scream God’s favor over those who are humble in heart. James 4:10 says that if we’re humble before the Lord, He will lift us up. 1 Peter 5:6 says that if we humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God He will exalt us. Most importantly, in Psalm 149:4 we find that it is the humble who are adorned with salvation. Do you show humility before your sons? Pray and ask the Lord for specific ways you can show humility today so that when the time comes, your sons will know how to show it, too. Continue reading →

Day 20: Heart Change

Encouragement from Brooke: The most foundational thing we can ask God for in lives of our sons is heart change. The Word says that what’s in the heart eventually comes out. I heard an illustration of this concept once from a pastor friend. He help up a Styrofoam cup with a little water inside and proceeded to ram his hand against the cup so that the water splattered everywhere. Then he asked this question: “Why did water come out of the cup?” So what do you think? Did the water come out of the cup because he rammed his hand up against it? Certainly a possible answer. But consider this: could it be that the water came out of the cup because there was water IN the cup? Continue reading →

Day 19: Salvation

Encouragement from Brooke: Day after day you will parent, intentionally seeking the heart of your son. But until the King of kings and Lord of lords turns his heart of stone to a heart of flesh, your son’s actions will be motivated by what is pleasing to him, rather than what is pleasing to the Lord. Everything hinges on this. Continue reading →

Day 18: Anger

Encouragement from Brooke: So much of the Christian life is a choice. Every day (multiple times a day) we’re presented with a choice to choose God or choose ourselves. Anger is a perfect example. You can just feel it coming, can’t you? Anger is an almost total body experience. Muscles get tight. Temples throb. Jew clenches. Explosion feels imminent…wooing us into believing we have no choice but to react. But it’s not true. We almost always have a choice when it comes to anger. We can choose to embrace it and sin. Or choose to put it away, and instead choose kindness, self-control, compassion, and love. Continue reading →

Day 17: Self-Control

Encouragement from Brooke: I wonder, out loud, how he could possibly want to choose discipline over joyful obedience. After days of willful rebellion from two little men, I’m spend and I cannot understand in that moment why ANYONE would choose this chaos – this misery – when simple obedience would change everything. Don’t they know the sweetness that would be theirs if they would just obey? The choice to love Him begins from the beginning…hearts made to worship Him…choose Him. Hearts that left to themselves will choose our own way every time. How can I expect my little ones to choose the good all the time when their own mama, a Jesus-follower for over 20 years, still gets it wrong? Grace. Grace. And more grace. And choosing to love Him more. Continue reading →

Day 16: Gentleness

Encouragement from Brooke: Personally, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with aggression. I don’t want to break my sons of their aggressive streak and I’m learning not to be afraid of it. But I do want to teach them how and when to use it. I’m beginning to think that gentleness is more of an approach to life than a specific characteristic to develop. Since they were born, we’ve whispered these words into our sons’ ears: God made men to protect women and care for them…Your job is to protect your little brother, not hurt him. There’s a time to play and a time to listen…God wants you to use your strength to protect, not to hurt. Superhero’s don’t look for fights, but they will fight to protect others. It’s OK to want to be the best, but the best people in life are the ones who serve others. A gentle word turns away wrath… Continue reading →

Day 15: Faithfulness

Encouragement from Brooke: What I want to talk about…what I want to pray about today…is that our sons would be faithful to God. Doesn’t this one prayer bring with it the solution to everything else we could talk about? A man whose first love is Jesus, will be faithful in all of the areas above [this is just an excerpt, this refers to faithful husbands, men faithful at providing a home, etc.]. He won’t be perfect, but he will possess the ability to be empowered by the Holy Spirit to be faithful. It is something worth praying for. Continue reading →

Day 14: Goodness

Encouragement from Brooke: In our efforts to raise our sons are we teaching them that if they do good things they are good? Righteous even? If we teach them that being good is all it takes, if our discipline and training focuses on their behavior, how will they know they need a Savior?Are we raising little Pharisees? Or are we raising Godly men with a heart of God? If a Godly son is your goal, you must aim for the heart. Because unless the heart is changed – touched – the behavior will stay the same. It might look a little different, morph some as they grow. But behavior is always a symptom of the state of the heart. What’s in the heart comes out. Continue reading →

Day13: Kindness

Encouragement from Sally Clarkson [author of
"The Mission of Motherhood"]: From personal experience and many years of observation, moms often discipline boys for being boys, instead of understanding that God wants them to grow into strong men…If we want them to be warriors when they are big, they need to be able to practice being little warriors when they are young…That’s not to say they don’t often need to be disciplined and trained when they stay off the path, but it is to say that boys will be boys, and that it’s a good thing… Continue reading →