Vision Casting for Our Children

How do we help our children dream big dreams? How do we help them dream of more than just a job and a paycheck? Do we even know how to dream big ourselves? Most of the messages they get from the world will be how they don't measure up, they are not enough, and they'll look foolish if they try something "big."

But the Lord did not create us to just walk in the same old path that everyone else walks: go to school, get a job, collect stuff, and plan for a leisurely retirement. 

So how do we raise our children to believe they are made for more?

"Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. 

                      Aim at earth and you will get neither."                                                                   C. S. Lewis

We have to help them understand from the time they are young that they are not made for this world. We need to give them, as part of their identity, a deep connection with the idea that their citizenship is in Heaven. Talk to them about it. Put it in context for them, for example, when they are exposed to the death of a grandparent or someone else they love. Help them by discussing it often. Everything about this world wants to attach itself to our souls. We have to help our children resist the insidiousness of the temporal. 

If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.

                                                                                                  C. S. Lewis 

Our children need to learn to recognize the pull of their spirit on their soul so they can practice listening to the Spirit. Tell them they are different, they have a different view on the world than most people have. Teach them to think of themselves as temporary residents here. Openly discuss how we will transition to the fullness of what God has for us when we leave here. Then they will learn to hold possessions and resources with an open hand, viewing them as tools to accomplish His Plans, not as things to own. And from that context, they will recognize the need to help others see with a True Perspective. They will learn to simply say, "Yes, Lord" to whatever He asks of them because they will understand that it is ALL about and for His Glory. Period. Everything we do and are here is about accomplishing His Purpose and bringing Him Glory. Help them learn to see this life from that perspective.

Because we love something else more than this world we love even this world better than those who know no other.   

                                                                                          C. S. Lewis

You may be sick of me talking about this topic on this blog, but I cannot help but testify to what the Lord is doing in the hearts of our children. He is bringing Glory to Himself through them. We haven't understood all this, but we are learning. He is teaching us why He has had us do many of the things we have done in all these years of raising these children. We simply knew He wanted us to tell them these things. And now we see why. 

Caleb just came home from several days he spent alone with the Lord, fasting and praying for wisdom and direction. He is allowing the Lord to prepare him for his time in Africa in May. He came in and sat down so we could talk.  He has been reading Radical, the book I already told you about. He had this look on his face, wonder and awe and excitement all mixed up together in Joy, because the Lord is "connecting the dots" for him. Caleb is at one of those glorious places where the Lord gives you a glimpse of His Perspective from atop a "spiritual mountain." And, as a Mom, there is so much gratitude and worship flowing out of my heart because of what He Has Done, that the screen is blurred by the tears. 

I just got home from the trip Mackenzy and I made to Seattle. And while we were together, the Lord showed me her heart and what He is doing there. He is deepening her roots in Him, increasing wisdom and giving her so much Grace. I am so excited!

Our God is AMAZING! 

And when I talk to Hannah and Jeremiah about the upcoming birth of their first son and hear their hearts, I just praise Him. They haven't chosen a name yet and many people can't understand what's taking them so long. But, I do. They are asking the Lord to show them who this little guy really is spiritually so they can choose his name very carefully, as a blessing to confirm who the Lord has designed him to become. They are asking for His Perspective about every decision in this "season of building" in their life together. It is everything we have ever prayed for for our precious firstborn.

God has done this. He wants us to think about every choice we make in the context of accomplishing His Plans, His Goals. And as we walk that way, our children learn to walk that way, too.

I have talked here, too, about what the Lord has been doing in the lives of Joshua and Benjamin. Well, He is accomplishing so much right now that we are simply praising Him. Just six years ago, these two had never even heard of Jesus. We were concerned about adopting Joshua and Benjamin because they were already 6 and 7. We worried about whether we could "undo" what they had already learned, growing up the way they did. And we couldn't undo it. But He could. He IS ABLE. The other day we got home after the younger kids were in bed and found this note taped to the doorknob of our bedroom door:

"Dear Mom and Dad,

I thank the Lord so much for ya'll, because without ya'll I don't know where I'd be. Both of ya'll do so much for me and someday I hope to do even half of what ya'll do for me. I'm hoping that I will be ready to do the Lord's will and please pray for me that I will do the Lord's will even if it costs all I have, even if it means I lose my life. But I don't fear losing my life as long as I'm doing it for my Father in Heaven, and I'm willing to give my all to God. I'm sorry for all the times that I've been disobedient and caused trouble. But when times get hard I just remember that I'm not running this race alone. I have a family in Christ to help me get through my hard times. I love you both very, very much.

                                                                                                           Joshua Conder "

It's so cute that he put his last name, like we wouldn't know which Joshua wrote this for us. :)  How can we contain this much joy as parents? 

Part of me hesitates to write things like this because I know it will cause some people pain, thinking that they haven't "done enough." Please DO NOT HEAR THAT IN THIS. Instead, start wherever you are in the process of parenting and pray. We are responsible to walk in the Light we have. We have made so many mistakes. Horrible mistakes as parents, but He Is Faithful to redeem it when we are seeking His Face and listening to His Spirit. Ask Him to show you what to do from this point forward.

Trust Him to accomplish more than you can ever ask or imagine. Pray for hearts of obedience. We have to keep asking the Lord to help us surrender more and more of our hearts to Him. He is Trustworthy. We can give it all to Him. We can place our children in His Hands. Completely in His Hands. The Fruit He is cultivating in our children is not the result of our job as parents. He alone is able. He will do incredible things in their hearts, in their spirits. And when it comes down to it, do we really have any other choice? Trusting Him is the only way our children will grow up to be who He created them to be.

I believe in Christianity as I believe the sun is risen not only because I see it but because by it I see everything else.    
                                                                        C. S. Lewis 

(Have I told you how much I love C. S. Lewis?) 

I feel this sense of urgency in my spirit for Christian parents to learn to expect more for their children. We have too often, especially in the United States, seen a diluted form of Christianity that makes us "nice people", but not Salt and Light in a dark, lost world. He didn't create us and send His Son to redeem us so that we could simply be "nice people." We can't be satisfied with that. 

John 14:10-14
Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work. Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves. Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it. 


Do we believe His words? Really believe them? Do we see the power He speaks of in our lives? Do we expect our children to walk in that power?
I don't. Not as fully as I should. But I want to learn it better. And He will continue to teach me.  
 

We should. 


And it should change how we parent our children.