Fridays Are For Family – What You Should Know About Your Child

05 Feb Fridays Are For Family – What You Should Know About Your Child

Kim and I had to wait for many years, and face recurring heartache before we finally were blessed with our first child, Laura Kate – and our lives have never been the same since. Before her birth, I could have never imagined how a little bitty, baby girl would completely, totally and forever change my life. I’m still amazed at how such a teeny, tiny person can wrap a full grown man around her little finger.

Now we’re blessed with four children – Laura Kate, Jack, Benjamin and Jonathan. So, I want to make sure that I’m the absolute best daddy that I can be. I want to make sure that I do the job that Christ has called me to and that my children so rightly deserve. Part of fulfilling my responsibility as their daddy is to help them become the individual that God created them to be.

That’s the principle we find in Deuteronomy 6:4-9. “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one! 5 “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. 6 “And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. 7 “You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. 8 “You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 “You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates…”

There ought to be a teaching and training aspect that naturally and normally takes place in the Christian home. However, it is very hard to do the job you’ve been called to as a parent if you don’t know your child.

So, let me pass along ten questions that were shared with me years ago that every single parent should ask and be able to answer.

1. What gives my child joy?

2. Who is my child’s hero?

3. What does my child fear most?

4. What activities give my child energy?

5. Which activities wear my child out?

6. If my child got to choose this year’s vacation, where would he or she want to go?

7. If my child could pick one activity for me to do with him or her, what would it be?

8. What music does my child like?

9. Other than school or sleeping, what does my child spend the most time doing each week?

10. What does my child want to be when he or she grows up?

Take some time to get to know your child – individually. What makes them who they are? Why do they do what they do? How does their mind work? These are important questions that every parent should be able to answer if they are going to fulfill their role and raise a healthy, happy and holy child.