So our church has just begun a new campaign, in which we are piloting a new program for Focus on the Family, called “Focus on YOUR family”.  Focus on the family is seeing a growing trend of kids walking away from their faith after growing up in a Christian home.  The campaign is centered around helping parents disciple their children, and not outsourcing it to other places, people, and religious institutions.  We actually got to go to Colorado and visit the campus and get trained to be family champions.  Not that I think we actually qualify to be called family champions because we are far from winning the war with our 2 year old.  Most days I think he is the champion, and I have been defeated by exhaustion, worry, and stress once again.

However, we are dubbed “family champions” and accept the challenge to teach those the skills we learned at Focus on the family training.  So many things come to mind but the quick thought I had for today is to be intentional about teaching your children things.  Make goals for the year of what you want your children to learn, and what your family can do together to grow closer to God.  Whether it be memorizing a verse a month, or if your children are little like ours, reading through a children’s bible in a year.  We decided this year to focus on teaching them how to pray, what it means to pray, and how to worship the Lord through music.  For our family we want to make it a point to have some type of outing together once a week.  It doesn’t have to cost money, like tomorrow we are visiting a couple who has a dairy farm.  Just being together and creating memories.  I seem to find that my son appreciates things more when its not a big deal, like going on a hike or to the park.  

I felt so blessed to have been able to go out to Colorado and get this training, because my husband and I are just starting down this journey or parenting.  We want to be intentional with our kids, and make sure that they understand the spiritual truths that are laid out in the scriptures.  It’s our job to teach them, not the churches, not their future Sunday school teachers or youth pastors.  Are we doing the job that God intended us to do?