Raising Little Christ Followers

I’m a first-time mom and I often sit and ponder how I am leading my little girl in God’s truth and righteousness. She’s just shy of four months, but she is growing fast. Even though she doesn’t understand what we do right now, we are setting the foundation for her life. She doesn’t understand what’s going on in the mornings when we read her Bible story and pray for our day, giving thanks and asking blessings and protection over her daddy. She just thinks I’m talking to her. When we dance to Jesus Bible songs she just loves the music and moving.  When we go to bed at night and read another Bible story… she doesn’t understand the words. But someday she will. It is setting the stage for when she is a little bit older and it gets me in the routine of getting in the word and praying with my daughter. My childhood mom and myself were never very close... but growing up one of the fondest memories I have with her is when I was about five or six years old and we would gather in our tiny little RV living room and we would read out of Psalms and sing Bible songs. I knew that someday I wanted to grow up and do that with my own kids. Now I have that chance, and I am blessed with an amazing husband who works very hard, so I can be a stay at home mom. He encourages, leads and pours into me so that I can do the same with our daughter.

When I mentioned to somebody about having Bible time with my baby girl they kind of laughed and said, “Who has time for that with a baby?” Yeah who am I kidding… when do I have time? The response I have come up with for myself is this… How can I not have time? Can I really go through life and be too busy to sit down and get in the word with my child? If I’m too busy now am I really going to have time as she gets older? I don’t want this to just be a phase. I don’t want it to only be something we do for a little while. I want to make the time as my child gets older, starts to understand. I want to be there when she has questions, heartaches, joys and struggles. I don’t want to be the mom who was too busy with work, dishes, housework, TV shows, washing laundry, friends, lists, shopping, whatever the case may be. I will have that to do the rest of my life. I only have a small window of time to lead my girl in truth and righteousness. There will be cleaning and housework to do until the day I die… but the light of Jesus that I invest in my child is something that will change lives. I already anticipate the day that she will see her sin for what it is, see Jesus for what He has done for her and ask him to be her Lord and Savior.

Is this post about somebody else? No. It’s only about me. Because sometimes I get so busy and caught up in my life and busyness that I am tempted to think that Bible time with my baby girl doesn’t matter all that much because after all she doesn’t understand. But I think Jesus has a soft spot for children. I think that Jesus would want little, itty bitty children to hear the stories of him and to be raised to know him. I realize every day how incredibly important and crucial my job as a mom is. If I do nothing else in life but lead my child towards Christ raising her with morals, values and knowing the great love of Jesus, I have lived a life well lived.

So, parents out there… I challenge you. No matter the age of your child, dig into the word with them, read Bible stories, pray with them. Lead them. And perhaps even more importantly is to find time to spend time with God yourself. Because that time with just you and God is what will help make you a good leader and good example to them. Children watch what we do with our lives, what we read, what we say, what we watch, what we do, even when we think they don’t see or aren’t paying attention. Raising our children to walk in the light of Christ, turning away from the darkness of worldly desires and attractions will be the single most important job we will have in life. We will never be perfect, but we can give it our all. Be encouraged and go raise Christ Followers.

~KrissElise

Tiny little feet that will someday follow in my footsteps.