Christian Parenting and why children behave as they do.

 Joshua 24: 14 – 18 says: "Now fear the LORD and serve him with all faithfulness…. But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served… or the gods… in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD."  Then the people answered, "….. We too will serve the LORD, because he is our God."

 

We are in partnership with the church in order for our children and us, as parents, to effectively know how to choose life. How to choose God and how to choose Christ.

 

What makes children behave as they do?

Humans are the most complicated of all creatures, yet they have the most poorly developed reflexes at birth - and have very little instinctive behaviour. Almost all human behaviour is learned behaviour. Just about everything we know, everything we do, and everything we believe is the result of the processes of learning.

 

The first learning behaviours that young humans exhibit are the result of imitation –they copy what take place around them. This is how they learn to speak, to smile, to walk, to develop intellectually - and to believe in God, and so they will display the behaviours and values that are practical, daily characteristic of the family they have been born into. Learning takes place on the basis of what the young children hear and especially what he or she sees, experiences and internalises at home.

 

Children copy what takes place around them. This is how they learn to behave well and most importantly, learn to believe in God with the childlike faith Jesus required from his followers. If we choose to serve the Lord as a family in Church, we practically make it possible for our children to learn to believe in, serve and love God.

 

Christian parenting is therefore of critical importance. From an early age they imitate us. Parents are in a child’s life the most important influence. That is why God in his great wisdom has done some very important things:

He ordained parenting in order for our children, whom he loves, to also love him back. God, in the Bible, gives us hundreds of directions for bringing up our children, and we should be learning from God’s wisdom for as long as we are parents.

 

We bring our children to church because we as a family choose to serve God and because it has a decisive impact on the rest of their lives.