How to parent distinctively as a Christian

Pretty much every parent on the planet wants children who are kind, brave, and able to make wise decisions, so what more is there for Christian parents? Is our parenting only distinctive for placing church over Sunday sport?

In our everyday conversations in the kitchen or the car, remembering that we are a child of God gives us better ways to cope with the tears, the anger, the terrifying questions, and the predictably recurring issues.

For the past couple of years, Faith in Kids has been taking a parenting seminar around the UK, exploring parenting through the lens of our Christian identity. Whether we’ve been in Belfast or Birmingham, Maidstone or Maidenhead, the questions we get from parents are very similar. All of us want to show our children the wonder of living for Christ. All of us feel inadequate to the task. All of us are reassured that our children’s eternity rests with Christ and not us.

Parents’ questions show that we all need help to keep bringing Christ into the everyday struggles of life in a broken world, in a natural way that brings our children closer to Him, rather than pushing them further away. I am just the same. When the same two siblings in my family get into the predictable argument that leads to the same sad outcome, I tend to the same despair or anger. I long to apply the gospel better to the most frequent issues in my family and my heart.

Burdens that feel like barriers

But many Christian parents have another question: one that begins: “How can I parent as a Christian when I have… ?” These questions are about more than practical help, or everyday wisdom. These questions reveal a heavy burden that can feel like a barrier to Jesus Christ working in our family. How can I parent as a Christian when I have a husband who isn’t a Christian? When I have an autistic son? When I have a daughter who has experienced trauma? When I have a teen who refuses to come to church or talk about Christian things?

These questions reflect our struggle to imagine how a breakthrough could ever come. We wonder whether our best efforts can possibly bear fruit in such hard circumstances. Our desire to fix our children’s problems can be huge. The situations we cannot fix can feel hopeless when, despite our pleading, God does not seem to be giving our children the comfort we crave for them.

God’s power in our weakness

Paul wrote of exactly such a situation. “I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness’.” (2 Cor. 12: 7-9)

Paul longed for the situation to change. Perhaps he, too, struggled to see how progress was possible. Perhaps Satan whispered his usual lies more loudly: “God can’t love you if He allows this” or “God can’t do any good in this situation, there’s no hope” or “The good news of Jesus isn’t big enough for a problem like this.” While the Lord did not change the situation, He radically changed Paul’s perspective. Paul came to see his own weakness as the means for the Lord’s power to work through his situation.

Let us, like Paul, learn to see that God’s power is made perfect in our weakness. Let’s trust Him to work through the problem and despite the problem. Let’s wonder how to take the hard step of talking to our child about how God could use this situation to help us to trust Him more. And let’s pray that God would use our thorns to leave both us and our child saying: “God is kinder and more powerful than we ever imagined.”