Family Driven Faith

Robert and I are reading the book Family Driven Faith: Doing What it Takes to Raise Sons and Daughters Who Walk with God, written by Voddie Baucham, Jr. Anyone who grew up in the Baptist church knows that Mr. Baucham is a man of God and speaks truth. He spoke at several camps that I attended while in youth group. He speaks at colleges on a regular basis. He has a family of 2 biological children and 2 adopted children. He is a great father as well as speaker, writer, professor, and pastor.
We are only in the second chapter, and we both feel so far that this is going to be a great book. Voddie Baucham is much more conservative than we are, but the main point of this book is truth: Family comes before anything else, even ministry outside the home. He discusses Deuteronomy 6 often, bringing in the fact that God calls us to multigenerational faith. We need to teach our children, our children teach their children, and so on. He emphasizes the fact that in today's time, as children grow up, they leave the church and the faith of their family because it never became their own or because it was never made a priority. As parents, we are commanded to teach our children, daily. We are to make Jesus the focus, not school (good grades), sports, etc (which are the things that most parents are focused on, Christian or non-Christian). Our desire shouldn't just be for our children to grow up with a good education and a sports scholarship, but to grow up serving Jesus and making Him the center of their life. We are to show them what it looks like to spend time with Jesus daily, to worship Him. We are to teach what true worship is. We are to show them what it looks like to make Him the center of our lives.
The chapters following are going to be about how to do this. I will let you know how it goes!

Robert and I had great conversation last night, and it was all about how to do these things despite how many hours Robert works. It's hard being here because Robert doesn't have a regular schedule, and he works a lot of hours. But, we need to use the time wisely that we have, and I need to make a point to take the kids to church even when Robert can't go. I need to spend time teaching them about Jesus, daily. We have a routine in which Robert and I read a devotional to her that has scripture, then a devotion that puts the scripture into terms that a pre-schooler can understand (all before bed). We sing a praise song or hymn, then pray. Karis knows that her routine is: "it's time to read, sing, and pray!" If we don't do one of those, she gets really upset J. I hope that as she grows up, we can begin to incorporate scripture memorization in (which we will begin soon), and really start focusing more on depth in scripture. I feel like we need to emphasize Jesus' love for her more, and what the gospel is all about. I think we have started off well, we just need to kick it up a notch. J I am looking forward to receiving more wisdom on how to put these things into practice more.