We (Melissa and I) have changed, er...adapted, our way of parenting. Since being at NCCd and learning about the gospel and the difference between it and what we have been taught we decided to apply this knowledge to the way we parent Caleb. So basically it's like this...We want to raise our children to know that we love them... period. There is nothing they can do to earn our love or make us love them more or less. There may be times when we are more proud or more disappointed but our love is constant. Kinda like the gospel. We want Caleb to obey us because he loves us not in order to gain our love. Compare that to the gospel, we are obedient to Christ as an outpouring of our love for Him. Not because we are trying to do something in order for Him to love us. This works pretty good for us in most parts. When Caleb gets in trouble, we always assure him that we love him but his behavior is not acceptable. When we discipline him (because believe it or not, 19 month old boys are not perfect angels as some would believe) our love for him is the center of discipline. The hard part comes in praising him. Because we do not want him to desire to do good things, instead we want him to do good things because he loves us and knows we love him. We hope that progresses when he is older to doing good things as a result of his relationship with Christ.
You can visit Brooks' blog HERE.
You might also want to check out Greg Wood's thoughts on Gospel Parenting HERE.
Truly the Gospel transforms and it is incredible to see it - HIM at work in our midst! NCCd's mission - to see the Gospel transform everything within our reach - ourselves, our church, our city, and the world.
