Teaching Kids About Godly Dreams

Teaching Kids About Godly Dreams - Parenting Like HannahWhat were your childhood dreams? Did you want to be an astronaut? What changed your mind? How do you know if changing your mind was what God wanted for your life or if He had another plan you missed somehow?

These are extremely important questions, not only for your life, but also for the lives of your children. The God who cares enough to know the number of hairs on their head, who sent His Son to die on the cross for their sins, and who tells us multiple times in scripture He will guide their steps (Proverbs 3:5-6, Isaiah 30:21, James 1:5-6 and many, many more) – must surely care about where they go to school, whom they date and marry, their career choices and their ministry choices. Our children have free will, but how much more rich and fulfilling their lives will be if they can align their decisions with what God knows is best for them?!

So what do your kids need to know about having godly dreams? There are a lot of things they will learn as they go through the process, but here are some I have learned over the years:

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Raising Kids Who Are Salt and Light

Raising Kids Who Are Salt and Light - Parenting Like HannahA young boy recently won a major acting award. The media is going crazy over this kid and his behavior during his acceptance speech. When I finally saw a clip, I realized he actually was just a well-behaved, pleasant, gracious, joyful child.

Ever wonder why God calls us and our children to be salt and light to the world? Those two things are so important to life. If you do not have them, you feel real pain. You will look around in a desperate search for anyone who has them. (In our salt soaked world that is hard to imagine, but think about how badly you want to see the sun after a couple of cloudy weeks.)

God wants our kids to stand out in their world. He wants the adults and other kids who see them to find them as refreshing and hopeful as seeing the sun after weeks of rain. By raising your kids to be salt and light to those around them, they will naturally draw others to them.

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God is GOOD Challenge for Kids and Teens

The "God is GOOD" Challenge for Kids and TeensIt doesn’t really matter if you are reading this post the day it went on the website or days, months or even years later. The world is filled with evil and lots of people who are more than willing to act in incredibly evil ways. Sometimes, they conduct their evil under the pretense of it being what God wanted them to do.

Yet God is GOOD. The Bible tells us all good things come from God. It also tells us “In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” (Matthew 5:16 ESV)

In the process of teaching our kids everything in the Bible about how they should behave, we sometimes forget to tell them their purpose as a Christian. We are to worship and obey God and serve Him by serving others and sharing our faith. Those last two things are what the scripture in Matthew is all about. Serving others allows us to point them to God and share His message with them.

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Teaching Kids About God’s Seasons

Teaching Kids About God's Seasons - Parenting Like HannahKids get a lot of exposure when they are young to God’s seasons of summer, spring, fall and winter. Yet, we rarely teach kids about the other seasons God sometimes gives us and always guides us through. Now if you are like me, the first time I heard about these other seasons, I was a bit puzzled.

I was in a Bible study and a friend shared about the season she was in and how she would be thankful when the next season arrived. She went on to explain that just like the stages children go through as they grow, God either provides and/or guides us through the various seasons of our lives.

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When Fear Mothers Your Children

When Fear Mothers Your Children - Parenting Like HannahThere are a lot of things about being a mom, especially a first time mom, that can cause even the bravest woman to be fearful. Most of us spend a lot of time in prayer and get advice from more experienced godly mothers to help us on our journey. For some moms though, the fear and anxiety can become too powerful. They can become a mother who is constantly anxious and hovers over her children in constant fear and panic.

If you had previous traumatic experiences in your life, an extra amount of fear and anxiety is to be expected. That’s what happened to Susie Davis. When she was in middle school in the late 1970’s a classmate walked into her classroom and shot and killed the teacher right in front of her. To make matters even worse, he lived a few doors away from her house and never served time for the crime because he was ruled mentally ill.

Unafraid: Trusting God in an Unsafe World, is the story of how this traumatic event turned a godly teen into a woman whose fear became debilitating. More than that though, it is the story of how God worked in her life to turn her fear into the godly confidence she has now. Davis weaves her personal story throughout the book as she shares the lessons she learned on her journey.

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