Start While They Are Young

Raising kids is not easy, but raising them to love God with all their heart is even harder. This world has so many distractions that take up our children’s mind and time. We stress the importance of going to school and getting an education from the time they start saying their ABC’s, but we wait until they get to adolescent before really trying to plant the seed of faith in their lives. This is where I think we make our mistake. It is important to start planting the seed of faith in their lives right after they start saying their ABC’s. In this stage of their lives they are like sponges, they soak up everything whether good or bad. This stage is the time to start praying with them more than over their food. This is the time to read bible stories with them and talk about the characters. This is the time to put Christian games and videos in front of them. This is the time to start talking about Jesus and taking them through the stages Christ went through. If they are babies then stay in the scriptures that talk about Him as a baby. In other words as they grow, you reveal more and more about Christ to them. You start bringing things out that would make Him interesting to an adolescent child. As you are teaching them their numbers and ABC’s, you also start teaching them verses with hand motions like “ I will hide His word in my heart, that I may not sin against God” Psalms 119:11 or verses like John 3:16 or 1 Corinthians 10:31 – “Whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God.” Psalm 19:1 – “The heavens declare the glory of God.” Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

Proverbs 22:6

“Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.”

These verses and many more are easy verses for children to remember. Once your child reaches the age 5, they should have 5 verses they know by heart, that means 1 verse per year. Is that too much?  Once they get to 5 and above you can introduce them to the Wordless Bible and start teaching them about the salvation of the Lord. Now all of this I’m talking about goes right along with all the educational things we are teaching our children when they are younger because we want them to be good readers and have a love for numbers. Now once they get to 9 you should let them see the God in you. You should allow them to see how you deal with the pressures of this world. By this time they should be ready to lead out in family devotion. This is training up a child. You are suppose to start at the age of 2 and keep going until they are on their way to college.  This plan of action is what I wish I had done with my own kids but I didn’t, but you have the opportunity right now to start training your child to love God with their whole heart. You might ask, Will this keep them from making mistakes or straying away from the Lord and I say no but you would have planted the seed in their life that is ready for watering. While the enemy is pulling them to the dark side, that seed will start growing and digging deeper into their heart and mind. If you trained them well, they will return to their training that started when they were two. 

Start training your children or grandchildren now and you will never regret the investment you made in helping them develop a  relationship with the Father.