Last year we started the The Fatherheart Fund, to date the response has been less than inspiring. I’ve spent sometime looking over world and South African Statistics and it’s scary! Continue reading
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It’s Not About Smacking! Part 2
Well, here we go, part 2.
I think its important to note that as much as our children will need grace from both God and ourselves, we will need grace from them. We are not perfect, we will get it wrong, sometimes horribly. But I believe that so long as the driving force behind your actions is a Godly love for you child, a deep desire to see them grow into all that God has planned and to not let anything get in the way of seeing Gods plan for their lives unfold before them, even if it is themselves, then we will be able to correct any miscalculations in our course as parents.
My Dad didn’t hit us as children, or at least I can’t remember, but he had a look that stopped us dead. The mere thought or warning of this look made us behave, well it made me behave, I can’t speak for my brother. But, even that is not enough as it is an external motivator. We need to train our children to be internally motivated to what is right, so that even when everything around them is saying do this or do that, their default setting, their point of reference is an internal compass informed by what they have learnt.
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It’s Not About Smacking! Part 1
A few weeks ago I wrote a blog entitled “Stop naffhousing the kids!” I had some questions regarding where is correction dealt with in the bible, so here we go.
I have been reading a book by Larry Tomczak called God, the Rod and your child’s bod, and I have been greatly encouraged and stretched and educated and, and and and…
I believe in smacking, but have been enlightened and encouraged by the fact that, it’s not really about smacking at all, it’s about biblical correction in the context of a loving relationship between parent and child. All who see and have experienced “smacking” and have become resentful, angry, disillusioned, frustrated, hurt, abused etc, must understand that their experience is not biblical correction but being at the receiving end of someone who had authority over you, expressing their idea of correction, not in love, but in hurt, retaliation and anger.
So, let’s get into it. I have taken many of the ideas below from Larry’s book, so get hold of one!
Remember this:
“IT’S BETTER TO BUILD CHILDREN THAN TO REPAIR MEN!”
L. Tomczak
No matter the cost
So this week we had to take our son to the doctor and were able to add our little bit to the pharmaceutical company’s bottom line, good times!
I sat there in the pharmacy wondering how come these little bottles cost so much, why was the price so high, why couldn’t the medicine be cheaper, especially since it was for such a good cause, my son’s health.
But here’s the beautiful thing, at no time during my contemplations on the conspiracy that is the pricing of medicine did I even question whether my son was worth the cost.
Not a fibre in my being even twitched at the belief that there is no cost too high and no price not worth paying for the health of my son, I would pay anything to save him, even if the price was unfair. The fact is my desire to have him healthy, better, saved, overrides any question as to the cost. The reason being, LOVE!
God showed this in that he loved us so much that he gave us his only son, the cost, massive, too high? Perhaps, but no matter, if it meant his children were to be saved, then the price was worth paying!
A Father’s heart is found in this, even though the cost is to high, the price unworthy of payment, we pay!
The imbalance in the world today comes from the selfishness of Fathers who see the needs, hear the cries but choose not to pay the price!
Our Father paid the ultimate price without blinking! Shouldn’t we take His lead?
Stop naffhousing the kids!
Well lets expand on the term naff-housing. I am not sure if it is in any dictionary, so in order to keep things professional what I will do is give my personal interpretation of what it means to naff-house.
Naffhouse-pronounced naff house-to treat like or make out as if one is in need of treatment that is unsuitable in terms of age, level of responsibility or calling.
That should do it!
I’ll get back to this but first some background. I am a guys guy, a mans man, but I do have feelings, I love my wife, my son and my God. He has created me to Father and mentor, to be a husband and man who the world needs. To be a bastion of His definition of what He intended men to be. That is what I am aiming for. But let me say at the outset that love never fails, I abhor abuse, detest unfair treatment of children but discipline, true Godly discipline does not even resemble the two.
I love my son with all my heart, yup I said it, heart. If you think using the words ‘love’ and ‘heart’ in the same sentence is a bit squishy, well then, get over it.
I am intending to raise a man who will stand for and where others crumble, a man who speaks the truth when lies and half-truths are safer, a man who will stare into the storm of all that God hates and declare he knows His God, he loves his God and nothing short of God Himself will move him from his resolve to stand for what he believes. That is my goal. God willing I will see this.
Never forget this message!
Protection
My son was sick last week and there was a possibility he’d have to go to hospital, but thankfully he responded well to meds and now doesn’t have to. I sat across the desk of his doctor as she told us this and there was this enormous urgency for me to take it all away.
It makes me think, Jesus had to die for us to appease the wrath of God, to fulfill the need for justice, to stand in the gap, to be the perfect sacrifice for our sin once and for all, however you view his death, whether as the fulfillment of prophecy, for atonement or simply to get us back on track, the one thing I’ve never considered is that He wanted to take the punishment.
The Need
“He called a little child and had him stand among them. And he said: “I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
“And whoever welcomes a little child like this in my name welcomes me. But if anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.”
Yesterday, I saw an email about 2 little children living in abject poverty. Nothing new I suppose, but my heart broke, I looked into the 3 year old girls eyes and saw my own child, I looked at her dirt covered feet and saw my own child, I saw her quivering lips and saw my own child. Her expression seemed to cry out, with a need that echoed thoughout my world, her cry was that she be loved, that she be protected, that she had a place to bury her head when afraid and know that no matter what, she was safe.
theFatherheart 