3 Practical Places to Find Balance as a Christian Parent

A sad observation I have made is that most parents tend to fall out of balance in one direction or another.  (And I'm definitely including myself in that observation.)  Balance is something we all need to strive for as parents.  Either we aim for gentleness and end up being too permissive or else we fear being too permissive and unintentionally end up as too harsh.

But we cannot concentrate so much on one side of the spectrum that we completely neglect the other.

We must constantly be praying and asking God to show us where we are too far from the center.

Parenting with gentleness need not be our exclusive focus.  But neither should “laying down the law”.

A balanced middle ground out to be what we are aiming for.

And if we are truly seeking it and asking for God's wisdom to find it, I believe he will answer and make the way plain for us.

James 1:5  ^“If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.”

Here are some specific places to search for wisdom:

1. The Bible

I mentioned in yesterday's post that a great study for parents would be to pick up a concordance and search out words such as “child”, “children”, “mother”, etc. and see what scripture has to say specifically regarding the parent-child relationship.  There is no greater place to find God's wisdom than in his revealed Word.

2. Books about parenting that are based on the Bible

Sometimes you will find that an author has a different perspective than you do or that they can offer ideas you've never thought of.  If the book is scripturally based, I think that gaining insight from Godly authors is a wise idea. You can find a list of my favorite Biblical parenting books right here.

3. Others who know you and your children

Don't be too proud to go to someone you look up to as a parent and ask them for advice.  This could be anyone – grandparents, grown siblings, pastor or deacons, or any other Christian parents you know.  If they have a lot of opportunities to interact with your family, that's even better because they may be able to see things about your parenting that you can't see from your perspective.  It's a humbling thing to listen to someone else's perception of your parenting, whether you've asked or (especially if) it comes as unsolicited advice.  But it is wise to listen and consider whether what they're saying is truly an area where you're out of balance as a parent.  The Bible has a lot to say about the positive results of humility, and that certainly applies to our parenting as well.

James 4:6 “…God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.”

Proverbs 22:4 “By humility and the fear of the Lord are riches, and honour, and life.”

James 4:10 “Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.”

Be willing to humble yourself before the Lord –  seek his wisdom and acknowledge the areas where you fall short. You will find that He surely will answer your request to learn how to become more balanced in your parenting.

This post is part of the Parenting with Gentleness series.

The First Step to Becoming the Parent God Wants You to Be

As we begin our series on Parenting with Gentleness, we must establish right away what the basis of our study is.

I can tell you all day long how to parent your children, but all I would be doing is offering my own opinions.

Instead we must turn to the wisdom of the Bible.

Not only does God's Word establish our authority over our children, but we must allow the Bible to have authority over our own actions.

We can't pick and choose which parts of the Bible are worth obeying.  We can teach our children that God says to “obey your parents”, but that's quite hypocritical if we're not willing to obey God's word ourselves, especially as it relates to our relationship with our children.

Parenting is about so much more than simply teaching our children to obey us.

Parenting is about teaching our children to obey God.  And there is no better way to do that than through our example.

So what are some of the things the Bible teaches us in regard to parenting?

Well, most of us are probably familiar with the common verses that talk about the parent-child relationship, such as:

Proverbs 22:6  Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

and

Ephesians 6:1 Children, obey your children in the Lord, for this is right.

If you're not familiar with what Scripture has to say about parents and children, (and even if you are!) I encourage you to do your own study about what God specifically teaches regarding parents and children.  Set aside the parenting books for now, and just look solely to scripture and let God speak to your heart about his plan for your relationship to your child.  Grab a concordance and look up words such as “children”, “child”, “mother”, etc. and you will find enough material to keep you busy for a good while.

But, for the purpose of this particular series, I want to move away for the most part from the typical parent-child verses and turn our attention to the remainder of Scripture.

You see, if we think about the first couple of verses that come to mind regarding parents and children, what are they likely to be about?

Children needing to obey.  Parents needing to train their children.

Am I right?

Those are Biblical concepts, and we certainly have a responsibility to train our children and our children have a responsibility to obey their parents.

However, if we focus entirely on turning out obedient children, we are overlooking a great deal of other things that Scripture has to teach us.

What about:

Ephesians 4:32  And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.

OR

Galatians 5:22-23 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.

Are we only to act with kindness toward other adults or toward children who aren't our own?  What about love or patience or gentleness?

I'm afraid that too often we say, “Yes, I need to practice kindness.  Or, “Gentleness is an area in which I should be more submissive to the Holy Spirit.” But we forget that we can and should practice those things beginning at home with our own families!

We are so focused on making sure our children obey that we forget that the rest of Scripture ought to have the authority over our interactions with them as well.

So today, parents, I ask you – is the Word of God truly your authority in how you parent your children?  Do you seek out all of what it says and not just the well-known parts about teaching children to obey?

Biblical authority must be the first step in the journey to becoming the parents God wants us to be.

This post is part of the Parenting with Gentleness series.

31 Days of Parenting with Gentleness

I am so exited about this 31 Day Series on Parenting with Gentleness!

UPDATE: This series has ended. Please join my email list to keep up with my latest posts on parenting and homemaking, plus receive access to my library of free printables.

This topic has been on my heart because, while I want to be a Godly mother, I have such a long way to go!

My tendency is to err on the side of being too strict, but when I read books or articles about what is typically called “Grace Based Parenting”, I often come away with the impression that all is grace and there is no room for reasonable consequences.

My goal is to find a balanced middle ground – not harsh, law-based parenting, but not permissive, “whatever-goes-because-we-all-mess-up” parenting either.

My desire is to parent with gentleness, whether that means I am extending mercy or whether I find it necessary to mete out appropriate consequences.

Join me for the next 31 days as we discuss what it means to parent with gentleness, why we should do so, and as we explore some practical ideas for becoming more gentle with our children.

Parenting with Gentleness (Will You Join Me?)

Every October, it is somewhat of a tradition among many bloggers to participate in the Write 31 Days challenge.  This is where we pick a topic and blog about it for 31 days straight.

I don't always participate since I don't want to purposely stretch myself too thin or stress myself out over meeting an obligation to write every single day.

However, I've had a topic on my heart for a long time, and I even have a complete book outlined out for this topic.  But I just haven't had the time to sit down and write like I want to.  I think participating in a 31 day series this year will give me a good jumpstart on writing the things that are on my heart, even if I don't complete a book start to finish in 31 days.

I'm afraid if I wait too long to write down some of these things I will lose a lot of the freshness and passion about them that I'm feeling right now.  And I really want to be able to write from the depths of my heart rather than just putting down words from an outline.

So…the topic I'll be focusing on for the 31 days of October is:

If I had to poinpoint a day that God began this work in my heart, I would say it was a couple years ago when I wrote this post: The Thing Our Children Really Need

Since then, I've been much more aware of how often I don't parent with gentleness, and I've been actively seeking wisdom as to how I can change that.

While I don't plan to post a super long post each day, I at least want to share the main points of my outline and try to get across to you what God has laid on my heart.

Do you need this series as much as I do?

Enter your email address to be notified when it begins!

UPDATE: I certainly didn't write anywhere close to 31 posts on this topic, but the ones I did write can all be found here!

3 Reasons I’m a Fan of Grove Collaborative

Have you heard of Grove Collaborative?

I order all of my household cleaning products from there – laundry detergent, dish soap, hand soap, etc.

Here's why I've chosen to use it as my go-to source for all of my household necessities:

1. Discover new non-toxic products – right now I'm using Molly's Suds for my laundry and Seventh Generation dishwasher tabs for my dishwasher.  I love how I don't have to search high and low for household products that I can feel good about using.  I've discovered products that I don't think I would have realized even existed because the choices at the local stores are just not as numerous when it comes to non-toxic products.  Grove Collaborative is always adding new items too, and I love trying out new brands!

Here is a picture of my most recent order:

Some of the products I liked, some I didn't, but I was trying some new things this time.  Those Mrs. Meyer's fall scents, though!  Mmm!!

2. Auto-ship

Oh, where would I be without auto-ship?  Out of laundry detergent, most likely.  I'm one of those people that makes a shopping list and then forgets to take it to the store.  I LOVE having my stuff auto-shipped where I don't even have to think about remembering it.

It's so easy to switch around my subscription too, so if I don't need something or I want to try out a new product, I can very easily change things around or even cancel the next month's order.
3. VIP membership

With a VIP membership, I get free shippng on every order, plus free or discounted products throughout the year.  Every so often, they send me an email letting me know I can add a select item to my next order for free or at a big discount.  I've discovered a lot of new products this way that I wouldn't have tried otherwise.

The prices are very comparable to what I would pay otherwise, and I love the convenience of having all my household needs shipped to me on auto-pilot.  I also appreciate how easy it is to turn off a subscription if I can't afford it one month.  They also remind me when it's time for my next shipment so that I have a chance to customize my order if I need to.  No shady business or jumping through a lot of hoops to avoid unwanted charges on my credit card – I really appreciate that in a subscription company because that does happen with some of them!

If you haven't tried out Grove Collaborative yet,you can get a free $10 credit to use on your first order when  you sign up through this link!

I'd love to know which brand catches your eye first!

One Simple Way to Take Better Care of Your Family’s Health

My family's health has always been very important to me.

I'm always reading and strategizing about things that I can do to make sure they get proper nutrition and keep their immune systems strong.

There are many, many reasons why processed foods are toxic to the body, and I've done my best to eliminate them and only feed my family whole foods or foods with the cleanest ingredients.

But I have an embarrassing confession to make.

There have been a number of seasons in my life where, in spite of my particularness about the groceries I buy, my family has still not been fed in a very healthy way.

What I mean is this:

Lack of proper planning has caused me to feed them thrown-together meals that, though they might be better than genetically modified boxed foods, are still very much lacking in nutrition.

Sometimes I feel like the dinner hour comes upon us, and I have no clue what to make, so I resort once again to the gluten free mac and cheese.

When they want a snack, too often I depend on “organic junk food”, which is still junk food, organic or not!

All of that is fine and dandy once in a while, but when I find myself doling that stuff out far too often due to my poor planning, I realize that something needs to change or my family's health will suffer because of it.

(By the way, the budget suffers too!  Pre-packaged and boxed foods, even brands that use ingredients I'm okay with, are not only lacking in nutrition, but they also cost much more than their homemade counterparts.  And when I decide to skip the packaged foods and go with only fruits and veggies, I still end up grocery shopping aimlessly, just grabbing a bunch of stuff that may or may not get eaten because I don't have a specific plan in mind for it.  Shopping that way costs so much more!)

For the past several months, my wonderful mother has done a good portion of the cooking for our family.  She has been such a blessing, helping me out tremendously while I've been dealing with chronic illness and a difficult pregnancy.

But I don't want to depend on her to do that forever.  That's a big job, feeding a family of 7!  I told her that I wanted to wean myself back off from depending on her to make dinner all the time and try to start cooking for our family again.

I knew that I'd never be able to do that without a solid plan in place, so I went back to my old faithful meal planning service – Build a Menu.

While I love the fact that I can pick and choose the items I want to cook, what's even better for this difficult season of life is that they also send a pre-made menu to my inbox each week, along with a ready-made shopping list!

You can get this same deal too!  Right now they have a special offer – buy the premium plan and get a year of Done-For-You menus free!

You can even choose menus for special diets if you like – such as gluten free or the super popular Trim Healthy Mama plan.

So, in a nutshell you get:

• Premium “build-your-own” drag and drop menu planning for one year
• A ready-made shopping list each week for the store of your choice (including my favorite – ALDI!)
• Plus an additional ready-made menu plan each week for a year

all of this for $40, or about 77 cents a week!  I'm very happy to pay someone 77 cents each week to do the legwork of planning a menu and making my shopping list for me!

They even tell me approximately how much the groceries will cost so I can stay within my budget!

Already I've noticed that I am less stressed because I know exactly what we're having and I can plan my day accordingly.  (That reminds me, I need to go get a roast put into the crock pot before it gets any later!)

My family is getting adequate nutrition.  We're eating balanced meals instead of whatever I happened to throw into my cart at the store.

I love that I am getting their bellies full at each meal and that I'm filling them with protein, fruits, and veggies.

Interested in trying out Build a Menu for yourself?

Check it out here!

(By the way, there is a 30 day money back guarantee, so if you're not thrilled with it, there is nothing to lose!)