A HEALTHY HOME BY GOD'S DESIGN
A brief
stroll through Amazon's list of parenting books reveals no shortage of experts
telling us how to raise our children. The problem is, these experts often
contradict one another. A book by Ann Hulbert and another by Steven Levitt and
Stephen Dubner summarize some of the experts who offer conflicting approaches
to raising children:
One
expert emphasizes the importance of training a baby to sleep alone through the
night. Otherwise, sleep deprivation might "negatively impact an infant's
developing central nervous system" and lead to learning disabilities.
However, advocates of co-sleeping warn that sleeping alone is harmful to a baby's
psyche and that the baby should be brought into the family bed.
One
so-called expert favored early stimulation through interaction. One hundred
years earlier, however, another expert cautioned that a baby is not a
plaything. There should be "no forcing, no pressure, no undue stimulation"
during a child's first two years of life. This expert also believed that a
crying baby should never be picked up unless it is in pain. A baby should be
left to cry for fifteen to thirty minutes a day: "It is the baby's
exercise."
Other
advice proclaims that breastfeeding is the only way to guarantee a healthy,
intellectually advanced child – unless bottle-feeding is the answer. One expert
says a baby should always be put to sleep on its back – until it is decreed
that it should only sleep on its stomach.[1]
You
can't follow everyone's advice. You can only raise your kids one way. You have
to choose which way that will be. Our Heavenly Father offers guidance in the
Bible on how we should raise our children. Let's learn what constitutes a
Healthy Home from the One who thought it up in the first place. Ideally, a home starts with Marriage and a
desire to build a family.
I. A
Healthy Marriage Builds a Healthy Home
God
instituted Marriage in the Garden of Eden when he said, "That is why a man
leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one
flesh." Genesis 2:24.
Later
on, Jesus reaffirmed what God the Father did by saying, "that at the
beginning the Creator made them male and female, and said, 'For this reason a
man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two
will become one flesh." Matthew 19:4-5.
When
two distinctly different individuals, a male and a female, come together in Marriage
and become one flesh, this usually results in having children. In some cases,
they may not be able to conceive children; that doesn't make them any less
valuable than those who do. In a healthy marriage, there is forgiveness, communication,
and cooperation.
A
healthy marriage doesn't mean there will never be any misunderstanding or
conflict. What matters is a language of forgiveness
and apology; it can be as simple as, "Honey, I'm sorry for the way
I responded; please forgive me." It is important that the one who asks
forgiveness hears, "I forgive you."
We want to keep short accounts and not let tensions build up.
In a healthy marriage, communication
flows easily. I am so sad when I hear
from couples where there is constant conflict in the home. There's an icy
atmosphere. They don't seem to enjoy talking to each other, listen to each
other, or make uninterrupted time for each other. There should be room to share
each other's concerns and burdens, as well as joys and hopes.
My
encouragement is: "Be each other's biggest cheerleader"; appreciate
the small things your wife or husband faithfully does for you. Don't take each
other for granted. In a healthy marriage, there is cooperation. In former generations, the male and female
roles were so much more clearly defined.
Men worked outside, and a woman's place was inside the home.
Nowadays,
in most homes, the woman works outside as well; this has brought a tremendous
shift in our society and, in my opinion, not always for the better. It is important to be aware of some of the
mental models from our families of origin that we carry. Maybe your Mom was a homemaker
who cooked three fresh meals a day. If a husband in today's world expects that
of a full-time working wife, you may have some tensions. What do you think? It is really challenging today, isn't it,
with the children's school, sports, and maybe other extracurricular activities.
Have conversations about how to make things work.
I
have difficulty with men who think they are entitled, and all the household
work has to be done by the wife. Understand
each other's stressors and support one another. In a healthy marriage, husband
and wife honor their wedding vows and remain faithful and loyal to their spouse
by maintaining sexual purity and not having affairs with other men or women.
"Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for
God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral." Hebrews 13:4.
How are you maintaining purity in your Marriage? If you violate your wedding
vows, remember God will judge you.
II. Unconditional
Love Keeps a Home Together
Psalm
127 reminds us that if God doesn't build a healthy home, everything we do to
create one is in vain. God has blessed you with children, a heritage from the
Lord. Psalm 127:3. We recognize that our children are a gift from God; they are
not a commodity to use or abuse for our selfish agendas. We are to love them
and train them responsibly with God's help.
First,
we must recognize that our love for each other brought us together in Marriage,
and God blessed our union by giving us children. Unfortunately, many couples
don't show that love toward their children; they terminate them before they are
even born or abuse them once they are born irresponsibly. But in a healthy
home, Christian parents love their children unconditionally. Group discussion:
What does it mean to love a child unconditionally? (Five minutes).
We
are to love unconditionally because God loves us unconditionally. He showed it
this way: Romans 5:8, But God demonstrated his own love for us this way: While
we were still sinners, Christ died for us." God's unconditional love for
sinners doesn't mean He never judges them. He gives plenty of opportunities for
sinners to repent and turn to God, but if they refuse to do so, in the end He
will righteously judge them and send some to Heaven and others to Hell.
Similarly,
loving children unconditionally doesn't mean endlessly giving them what they
want and never setting boundaries or correcting them when they do wrong. Our
love for our children should never be based on their performance. I have heard
of parents who severely punish children for getting any grade below an A+. What
does that communicate to a child?
Even
when they get bad grades, we love them because God loves us when we perform
poorly. Do we tell our children we love them?
They do need to hear that from us. When God wanted to tell the whole
world that He loved Jesus, He said it so loudly at the time of His baptism, "This
is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased." Matthew 3:17
III. Training
up Children responsibly makes a Healthy Home.
Proverbs 22:6, "Train up a child in the way he
should go, even when he grows older, he will not abandon it." Group
Discussion: What does training a child in the home look like?
From
the time our children are born, we only have a short window of time, at most
ten years, to train them well. As Christian parents, when it comes to training
our children, we often think of teaching them Bible verses to memorize, praying
before meals, and taking them to Church on Sundays. Training them well at home
constitutes all that and much more.
Jesus'
earthly parents, Joseph & Mary, did a great job in training young Jesus in
a home of at least six siblings (four brothers and two sisters). Mark 6:3: It
was said that "Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and
man."
Their
training may have included teaching the Hebrew Scriptures. Deut 6:6-7: "These
commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on
your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the
road, when you lie down and when you get up." This Judaic way of training
a child gives us a model to follow. It is not a classroom-type impartation, but
it happens while you engage in mundane work and activities.
For
example, while driving your child to a music lesson or soccer game, doing
chores at home, or helping with homework, you have plenty of opportunities to
model and teach godly ways. Train them while they are young! Part of training is clarifying expectations
and setting boundaries or limits. That
could mean that before going to the store, a party, or maybe church, you talk
with the children about what you expect of them.
Johnny,
when we go to the store, don't ask me for chocolate or candy; we will have a
snack when we get back home. Before
coming to church, during worship, I want you to sit with Mommy and Daddy; you
are not going to play with other children until Sunday school time. So we set certain boundaries, let them know
our expectations, and stay consistent.
This
will only work if both parents are on the same page about expectations,
training, discipline, and how it is implemented. Otherwise, our children figure out our
weakness and play them to their advantage. Let's say instead of doing homework,
your 7-year-old comes to Dad and says, "I want to play so-and-so video
game." Dad says no, and the child then goes to Mom, who says it's
okay. Then the tussle starts, and the
child becomes a manipulator who sets the parents up against each other. Watch for the child trap, and stay a strong,
united team.
Sometimes,
when your child is struggling behaviorally, it means their "emotional love
tank" is empty. What do I mean by that? Children have a soul hunger for
eye contact, affection, and affirmation from their parents; if they don't get
it, they will often act out to get attention. One last thing! Be careful with
excessive screen time. A recent study shows, "Kids who have their own
smartphones at age 12 are more likely to develop eating disorder symptoms than
their peers without the devices." Parents, establish no-cellphone times
and engage with them constructively. God, by design, wants us to build a
healthy Home. A healthy marriage, unconditional love, and responsible training
of our children constitute a Healthy Home. Amen!
[1] Ann
Hulbert, “Raising America: Experts, Parents, and a Century of Advice About
Children (Vintage, 2004), page 298; Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner,
“Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything”
(William Morrow, 2009), page 148
