What is Most Important to You?
Having vs. Becoming
What is more important to you? What your child has or who your child is becoming?
I don’t know about you but it is really easy to get caught up in what my kids have or don’t have. There are things they need, whether it’s clothes for school, new shoes because they’ve completely worn out their old ones, equipment for the sport they’re playing, or something else for school or for whatever extra curricular thing they happened to be involved in at the moment.
And then… there are the things they want. Or, let’s be honest, the things we want for them.
We want them to have the things they want to have, the things their friends have, the things we didn’t have, and we think that if they have all the stuff, they’ll be happy. We know deep down that’s not true. But we live in a world where, for many of us, it’s easy to click buy it now on Amazon.
And so we do.
Before we know it we’re sucked into the vortex of the culture of stuff. We want our kids to be happy. But in trying to make them happy we’ve lost focus on what matters most. Because at the end of it all, it’s not about what our kids have or don’t have that really matters, what matters most is who they become.
But what is temporary has a way of crowding out what is eternal.
What is Most Important?
I think that’s why Moses, as he gives the people of God the word of God, he tells them this…
Moses wanted every parent present that day to keep their focus on what matters most, who our children are becoming. He knew that if the family kept its focus on the word of God and the love of God then every son, every daughter, would be shaped and formed by God’s word and would come to know just how much their Father in Heaven loves them.
What’s important 20 Years from now?
Let me encourage you to take a moment and just imagine your son or daughter 20 years from now. What do you want to be true for them at that point in their life?
The answer to that question is probably more about the kind of person they are, the kind of person they have become, rather than what they have or don’t have.
So what if we were to begin with the end in mind? Sometimes we get too caught up in the moment, overly concerned with what our kid’s have or don’t have, instead of who they are becoming. But when we begin with the end in mind, with who we want our kids to become, it changes how we parent.
Take time today to tell your kids about the great love of God. Help them know what it means and what it looks like to love the Lord our God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength.
Talk to them about God’s desire for them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up in the morning.
Write down some of your favorite verses as reminders and tape them to their mirror or put them in their room.
Find time every day to share your faith with them as you think about and pray about who you want them to become.
Don’t let what is temporary crowd out what is eternal. Focus on what matters most. It’s not really about what they have. What is most important is who they become.
Learn more about how to Imagine the End in: Parenting Beyond Your Capacity
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