Having kids can totally change your life. In fact, as much as it sounds like a negative thing, it really isn't. If your lifestyle remains unchanged, it will probably result in a much more negative thing for not only yourself, but even more so for your child.

You see, children are built in attention magnets. They cry for attention the moment they are born. Our bodies are attuned to respond to their cries. We can respond directly, or delegate responsibility. Unfortunately many chose the latter, some because of financial liabilities, but many I'm sure chose to delegate because it appeals to the flesh. Until children can better regulate their emotions, be prepared to give up a lot of time. I'm talking about the things that are common, vacations, movies, eating out, and even what you are probably doing right now: reading this from a device. If you wish to love your child and raise him up in the ways of God, let me share the secret ingredient: death to self. Why? Because God Himself also 'died to Himself', by sending Jesus fully as a man to atone for our sins, because He loves us.

Children are very strong intrinsic learners. Their early inability to learn through explicit instruction is made up by their innate ability to learn through the various non-verbal cues observed within their environment. Our children's worldview is defined mostly by how we respond naturally to circumstances around us. Children pick up even the slightest nuances of tone, from the exclamation we make after accidentally spilLg something to the affirmation (or non-affirmation) we give our spouse. When there is a contradiction between what we say to what we actually do, they will always fall back to the imitation of our behaviour.

We have to be the direct influence of our children. They are the mini reflection of ourselves. We define their attitude toward the things that are fun to the things we hate or uphold dearly. Every second of behavioural delegation (I.e. to grandparents) must be reinforced by at least twice the amount of direct influence from ourselves. Godly parenting demands our entire being and resource, especially in this day and age, when we can outsource parenting so easily.

Today many of us pride ourselves when we are able to untangle the chain of parental burden from our children. We pride ourselves for raising an independent child that is able to 'play by himself' or with other caregivers. We pride ourselves that our kids can learn through various media 'on their own', that they prefer to occupy time by themselves. Here is the unfortunate fact: We find pride in these things because they appeal to our flesh: there is no need to die to self if our children are independent. Surely there is value for encouraging independence, however there is a very fine Le that distincts an independently distracted child to an independently obedient child.

I'm not advocating nor talking about helicopter parenting. I am talking about discipleship. Parenting is 24/7 discipleship. It is both quality and quantity time. We must disciple our children, or end up allowing the lusts of this world to disciple them instead, and as we all know the latter requires little if any effort at all. Our desire to disciple our children and bring them up in the ways of God must outweigh every earthly desire within our being. Children are gifts from God Himself, any other response simply does not honour responsibility to His provision of a soul for our caretaking. If we fail to disciple even our children, how much more should we expect to even attempt to fulfil the great commission? If our young ones desire to spend more time with 'other things' than pursue a relationship with us, we have failed as a parent. Liken this to our relationship with God: if we desire to spend more time with the things of this world, rather than revel in consuming Christ, it simply reflects a fallen idolat
rous heart, consumed by the lusts of this world instead. As crazy as it seems, I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.

Tough words aside, how then do we now go about? Honestly is a very precious thing these days, so I'll be very honest and say this: I too struggle with my flesh, neither do I have all the answers. I will share what I do know: the very first thing you have to be certain of is where you stand in Christ. As we struggle with time and meeting the daily demands of raising a child, there will be some good days, some bad days and some truly horribly sleep deprived days. Recognise first that religiously wanting to 'meet up and assemble together' aka church (Heb 10:24-25) does not make one more holier. In fact pretending that the family dynamics through masked smiLg and 'thinking everything is ok' in public settings (especially in a church setting) will completely undo the values that we attempt to impart, and encourage a great deal of 'hypocrisy as acceptable'. FaiLg to do 'quiet time' does not make you less of a child of God than we were the day we recognized our need to repent from our sin.

Instead what we should strive for during these rather tumultuous (yet greatly rewarding) period of our lives is to impart the yearning or desire after God. They must see us thirst after God, despite given their finite understanding. Let them see us respond in love, in gentleness and kindness, especially toward our spouses (I fail terribly). Let them see us spend our pockets of free time speaking about the things of God, and choosing to devour (from a real book, not eBook) the things of God. Rather than picking up our phone to 'read stuff' (remember they are mini reflections of us and when they do get their phones when they are older, and if all we do is constantly check our phone, they cannot help but mimic our device addiction. Use technology wisely, sparingly.). These are the little overt things we can do to influence our children at a very early age. Let them cultivate a love for reading. Many other domains in life will suffer without a proper foundation in literacy, including the word of God.

At certain stages of child rearing, pockets of free time are hard to come by. That's when we resort to covertly thirsting and seeking after God. Can't read a book? How about listening to one? There are tons of audio book options available even for Christian books. Play it from your phone, use a Bluetooth ear piece that you can stick into your ear discretely. Devour God's precepts as you cook, clean and play with your child or even put your child to sleep. Believe me, when God has something to say to you, it will pop out at you, not once but several times despite the environmental noise.

Somebody once told me, 'you can always earn your money back, but you can never recover time lost with your children'. I once met a very successful (according to this world) businessman in his sixties regretting how he had 'made his millions' but completely failed as a father. He shared how as a young father he simply could not commit time to be with his family, and now his children who have all grown up, are unable to commit the same in his now free time. They had reflected their father in their adulthood. I truly believe if you have the financial means to have a stay at home Mum, make it happen by all means possible. Be prudent and do your sums and make sure the insurance is covered first. God has given us logic and wisdom to plan for the future. Those who do not plan to succeed, only plan to fail. Likewise we too must plan what's best for our child within the framework of what God has planned for us.

Perhaps the question here is, do you thirst after God? There was too a period of my life when I became complacent. It was the moment I thought I knew it all, until God showed me otherwise. Perhaps you too were once thirsty and now not so? Dear friend, I can assure you that your thirst is being quenched by 'carbonated worldly flesh juice'. Drinking too much of that stuff automatically cuts off the tap supply for 'living water'. The fact that you have stumbled across this annoyingly long message is evidence that God still cares for you. Turn back to him now, for your own sake and your children.