Surprising Tip For Getting Kids to Obey

AI can be truly amusing at times. I requested a stock photo recently and typed in “paper turkey”. What I expected to get was this

Instead, what it generated was this

While technically correct, a crumpled paper flag of the country Turkey wasn’t even close to what I wanted or had imagined!

Your children are not mind readers. Nor do they necessarily have the life experience to know what it means to “clean your room”. They may also have very different definitions for the words you use (Not too many years ago, the word “bad” actually meant “good”!). Sometimes their supposed disobedience is actually a breakdown in communication.

The next time you ask your children to do a task, try these tips.

  1. Carefully and fully explain what you want them to do. For example, instead of “clean your room”, try “I need you to pick up your toys, put your dirty clothes in the hamper and make your bed.”
  2. Make sure they know how to do the things you want them to do. My father went to military school, so when we made our beds, the sheets were expected to have “military corners”. That is a skill that must be taught and practiced before a child can do it well independently. Teach your children how you want a particular task done and then help them practice until you are confident they can do it to your satisfaction independently.
  3. Explain terms they may define differently well. For example, “wash your hands, means soap them up really well and scrub every inch of all of your fingers back and front and then rinse all of the soap off”.
  4. Give deadlines. Often the breakdown comes because the parent wants something done immediately and the child thinks he or she has all day to do it. Giving a specific deadline (for little children, you can use timers or things like meals as markers) can help tasks be completed on your desired timeline.

Eliminating communication mistakes can also help you know when your child is truly rebelling against your commands. Otherwise you may be correcting and giving consequences to a child who really was trying to obey you.

Surprising Questions to Indicate the Health of Your Family

As part of the studies I am undertaking for my Masters in Social Work, we are learning a lot about family counseling. Our readings often contain questions they suggest we ask families to get a better indication of the health of the families with whom we are working. There are not right or wrong answers per se, but the answers can point to strengths or weaknesses in a family’s functioning.

These questions are taken from a variety of sources, but would be interesting to discuss as a family.

  1. Do you eat individually or as a family?
  2. What do you usually talk about when eating?
  3. Who does most of the talking?
  4. What adjective would you use to describe your family meals?
  5. If you could change your family in one way, what would it be?
  6. What is happening when you have the most conflict? What is happening when you have the least conflict? (Context – everyone is tired, Grandma is here, etc.)
  7. How well do you know your neighbors?
  8. Are outsiders giving to your family financial, spiritual or emotional support? Do you give back to your community/church/neighborhood?
  9. What are the strengths of your family?
  10. What would Jesus say to your family if he had dinner with you?
  11. How easy is it to tell each other hard, scary or emotional things?
  12. What roles do family members play within the family?
  13. Who is in your family’s support network?
  14. What does your family believe about God, Jesus, the Bible, Christianity, the Church, God’s commands?
  15. Have each person tell a family story that they believe best illustrates your family dynamic.
  16. How does our family solve problems?
  17. What types of non-verbal communication does each family member use to let your know he or she is getting upset or angry?
  18. Is your family more controlled or spontaneous?
  19. How does your family handle conflict?
  20. How does your family motivate its members to learn, grow or improve?

Did family members feel safe in answering the questions truthfully? Did different members of your family have different answers to the same question? Were they wildly different? How do you feel about the answers given to each question? What strengths do they reveal that you can build upon? What weaknesses do they reveal that need to be corrected or improved?

Healthy families take work. Everyone thinks their family is “normal”, but even if that is true, it doesn’t mean your family doesn’t have room to grow and improve. Pull out these questions periodically for quick checks or find new ones to dig even deeper. Having a healthy family will make it easier for your kids to obey God and eventually create their own Christian families.

Surprising Personality Traits That Can Make Being a Christian Harder

Christian parenting is never easy, but some children are born with personality traits that just make it a bit easier for them to obey God. How much of the original trait is nature versus nurture will probably be debated for many more years to come, but you have to parent the child you have in front of you. So a child (often the oldest) who is more compliant and willing to obey rules, for example, is going to find it much easier to obey God’s commands than a child who is born with a rebellious streak.

Mind you anyone, with any personality traits, can become a strong Christian. Look at Peter and Paul. Both would probably have been considered to have difficult personalities at times, yet they are two of the most well known and perhaps productive Apostles. If your children have traits that may make it difficult for him or her to live a Christian life, with lots of teaching, coaching, correction and redirecting, they can not only overcome the tendency making it difficult for them, but also turn it into a strength.

Don’t believe me? Have you ever seen a stubborn child? You know the one who just won’t budge about anything, but digs his or her heals in even harder? With a lot of work from engaged Christian parents, that stubbornness can become perseverance – a critical Christian character trait!

So what are some of the personality traits you may have to help one or more of your kids to overcome in order for it to be easier for them to obey God? Here’s a partial list to get you started.

  1. Risk takers. These kids live for risky endeavors. They’re the ones that often believe they will never experience negative consequences for their risky behaviors. If God says getting drunk is a sin and you give them fifty practical reasons why it isn’t good for them, but someone dares them to get drunk, well…… If you work with this child long enough though, that risk taking can be challenged into a willingness and desire to go into the tougher mission fields or ministry areas often neglected by Christians who prefer a little more safety and security.
  2. Pleasure seeking. This one can be tricky to spot because who doesn’t like a great meal or a manicure or a new outfit. The problem is when the pleasure seeking becomes a top priority and the attitudes become more like selfishness and entitlement. The flip side of this one is tough, but perhaps that seeking of pleasure can be turned into a passion for helping Christians live out Philippians 4:8.
  3. Materialistic. These kids are all about money and stuff. Flipped and it can become a passion for generosity – earning money to help other people get the stuff they need but don’t have access to.
  4. Impatient/Angry. These have all sorts of negative consequences. The antidote is forgiveness, but it can take a lot of work as a parent to teach angry children to forgive. Flipping it is threading a very fine needle because people often take this out of biblical context, but working to right injustices is a way to channel passion into something other than impatience and anger.
  5. Poor impulse control. This one is so important that even secular experts encourage parents to spend a lot of time working with their children on impulse control. The flip side? These kids are quick, they just need to learn how to make godly choices quickly before saying or doing anything…that’s the control part. If they can master that, they can become those Christians that quickly jump in during a crisis and start making things better for those involved.
  6. Talkative. The Bible tells us a lot of sins come out of our mouths. This is one of those issues that can have a huge positive impact when flipped. These kids are potential teachers, ministers and other people who speak publicly about God. They are not as afraid to share their faith because they are also often extroverts. They may also write great Christian books because they often learn how to speak and write well.
  7. People pleasing/popularity seeking. Some kids have a strong need to be popular, to have tons of “friends” or to make others happy even if what the others want isn’t godly or wise. This has some roots in self esteem, but can also be flipped so the child has a wonderful servant heart and wants to share the Gospel message with others because it is in their best interest.
  8. Critical. Nobody may like a critical person, but moderated with a loving godly heart and these are the people that notice issues before they cause too many problems. They can notice the leak before it ruins the proverbial building. They just need to learn how to phrase their critiques so they will be heard and heeded as useful.

If you see some characteristics of your children on this list, don’t panic. They can become like Peter and Paul, but you and they and any other Christians you can enlist may have to put in the time and effort to turn those traits that can pull them away from God into ones that help the Kingdom.

When Your Kid Doesn’t Fit In

We all seem to be a bit hardwired to want to fit in….to be popular. It’s perhaps a little less common in adults, but for children and teens it can be a major preoccupation. Some are content with being on the margins of popularity, while others will do literally anything to be considered popular or a member of the top social group.

While there are Christian character traits that will make people more likable in general, our beliefs mean we can’t do or even believe a lot of what popular culture and hence many peer groups promote. Your kids may go to a Christian school, which can help, but often even “Christian” kids aren’t really living their faith or even have any knowledge of what God commands of His people.

The truth is that if your kids are going to be strong Christians, they also need to learn how to stand with God – even if it means they are left out of parties or certain people they like won’t date them or befriend them. They need to learn how to do this without it destroying their self esteem or causing them to become arrogant, bitter or ugly in how they treat those who reject them.

They need your help in identifying their support network. Who are those people who will accept them and encourage them to obey God – even if they don’t agree with their Christian beliefs? Who will support them when they are struggling? Who will listen when they need to vent? Who will give them hugs or pray for them?

Remind them that even when you aren’t around to love and support them in person, you are always praying for them. Encourage them to use prayer and scripture to remind themselves that God is with them. Teach them how to reach out to their support network when they are struggling.

The truth is that Christians are never truly alone. Satan wants your kids to feel passing loneliness to their core. He wants them to crave fitting in and being popular. If he can accomplish that, it will be easy to get your kids to disobey God in a myriad of ways. Because the truth is that culture will always be anti God even when it pretends to be Christian. Your kids have to have the strength and courage to stand alone if necessary to please God. Fitting into the culture surrounding us rarely ends well for the Christian. Teach your kids to be comfortable on the margins.

What Will Distract Your Kids From God?

The devil isn’t going to walk up to your kids dressed in red and carrying a pitchfork. He might not even get them enmeshed in a some sin from which they find it difficult to extract themselves. If you are familiar with the works of C.S. Lewis, however, you know often Satan uses more subtle tricks to move us away from God. One of those tricks is to distract your kids so that God – and obeying and serving Him – slips their minds.

It’s not that they forget God exists or even stop believing in Him. They just don’t think it’s that important to obey Him, serve Him or make Him happy. They think they have a free pass to Heaven and can do whatever they want because God has become a very low priority in their distracted state.

So what will distract your kids from being who God wants them to be? I wish I could tell you and give you a full proof battle plan to protect them. The truth is that each of your kids will be potentially distracted by different things. Some will be distracted by the bad things that happen when one lives in a fallen world. Others will be distracted by so called good things, like money or fame. Others will become distracted with their jobs, sports, leisure activities and even family.

Part of the way you can teach your kids to avoid becoming distracted is to let them know that it can happen so innocently and subtly that they may not even realize it is happening. Talk about the areas in which each of them feels they could be vulnerable. Discuss ways of noticing for themselves and for others in the family when someone is becoming distracted. Figure out ways to get back on track when one of you realizes you have been distracted for a time.

Don’t let Satan win your children away from God by the easiest and most subtle trick he’s got. Protect them by preparing them. Sometimes awareness is the best prevention of all.