Keepers at Home Part 10: Training them up...

I got a tragic reminder yesterday of why we raise the kids the way we do. An old friend stopped by who has had some serious trouble with her daughter who is now 18. They are completely estranged for the time being and the daughter is out of the house. Her 12 year old son is pulling up the rear.

I know that she loves her daughter and tried to "do" all she could for her. But she treated her like a friend and allowed her to taste the fruit of the world not realizing the child would eventually want more and more of it.

It is dangerous to let your children taste the fruit of the world and not expect them to like it. When you let them taste such sweet fruit (oh, didn't you know worldly fruit is sweet?) they will develop a taste for it.

See, the problem lies in when we only let them the taste the sweet part. We love them so we would never let them get into the rotten, putrid, decaying middle now would we? No, of course not.

But blindly, we let them lick, lick, lick that sweet outer shell until when they are old enough, we cannot keep them from it and all of a sudden we find that they are licking closer and closer to what lies in wait inside. All panic ensues but at that point it is too late for our influence.


Now her daughter is tasting the fruit that is less sweet and less sweet. Soon she will be down to the really bad part and perhaps a road in her life that she could have never been on. But she has a taste for it now. The addiction to the world is already there. It is a wonder we ever escaped it at all. We all know how hard it is to fight it every day in every way.


WE my sisters and daughters, are responsible for how our children think, act and turn out! Let them taste too much of the "sweetness" of being outside the home and involved in worldly activities that are "fun" and they will develop a taste for it. It will be hard to reel them back in to being keepers at home when their tastes become harder to satisfy.


Sure, of course we are allowed to do outside activities, and in many cases, we even should, but we should always ask ourselves what eternal effect it is having on them. You'd better ask yourself and if you don't like the answer, don't ignore it.


Ask yourself; Is it glorifying to God? If it is NOT glorifying to God, WHY WHY WHY would we ever continue it?

One foot in the world and one in the church can bring one dangerously close to drowning. I envision one foot on a rock, stable and secure and the other on a balloon that is constantly being blown bigger. One may be a little uncomfortable sometimes but you will withstand the storm every time. The other is quite cushy but highly unstable. So bigger and bigger the balloon gets until you are so off balance you fall into the abyss of sin.

Be seriously and diligently careful about what you let your children do and know that one way or the other you ARE training them.

Train them to serve one Master or you are training them to try to serve two.


Your choice. Every day.