Discipling Kids is Side-by-Side Work

therefore as the elect of God holy and beloved put on Tender Mercies kindness humility meekness longsuffering bearing with one another and forgiving one another if anyone has a complaint against another even as Christ forgave you so you also must do but above all these things put on love which is the bond of perfection and let the peace of God rule in your heart Hearts to which you are also called in one body and be [Music] thankful we are in the thick of it with all the farm chores that need done around here every morning we wake up um after we have breakfast everyone has their assignment everybody knows where they're supposed to be and what needs to get done to help this family run our garden is fully in we have four pigs that we're raising 75 meat birds that um are just little chicks right now but they have to be moved every day to Fresh grass and um everything's just opening up around here we also have our layer hens um I love looking at some of the zenas and maragold these are my hostas they're just about to open um we have some milkweed that is just so full and the bees are all over it in the early morning hours you can't even go out around this milked because this is a hot spot for bees if you're new to my channel Channel my name is Sherry I'm a homeschooling mom to 10 kids one is graduated we have seven in school and two little ones I love coming on here every week and just sharing our family life with you and encouraging you as The Homeschool mom in the great work you're doing with your kids before my husband left for work this morning he went out and moved some of our little chicks to Fresh grass which is a huge help um these chicks are about to the point where we need to separate them into different uh chicken tractors because they're getting too big for the ones they're in but we do like to put them on Fresh grass every day and um the the tractors can be kind of heavy so I can manage it with the kids but it's really great when my husband does it for us we've been having quite a bit of work to catch up on around the house here we were able to get away for a little bit to a family reunion and as it is whenever you go away when you come back there's a lot waiting for you so just catching up getting everything unpacked and getting the house back in order is what we're doing this week I've been thinking a lot lately about discipleship with our kids and um I think we have a graduate now and when you have a child who is out of the house who's an adult you reflect on these things a little bit more you realize how short your time really is with your kids you see what was important and what what there's some things that you thought were so important at the time that really aren't that big of a deal with all the work that needs to happen to make a household run I know I as a mom sometimes just get in this mode of what needs to be done next and I forget how impressionable my kids are how short our time is and how much work there is to be done to reach their little hearts with the truth of God's word with the truth of who they are as his creation and the hope that we have in eternity because of God's Gift of Salvation through his son Jesus I can so easily get very focused and zeroed in on just right here and right now and lose that Eternal perspective and I think this is something that happens to all of us so I've been thinking a lot this week about discipleship and this this important role that we have as moms to pass on the truth of salvation of the Gospel to the Next Generation and are we doing this well I thought of specific typically four ways that we disciple our children and the first one is teaching which is something really obvious this is something that's very important to homeschoolers to be able to teach our children the truth and teaching is just very direct it's intentional you there's thought behind it but another way is interactive this is a second thing that I thought of not just going about the day um with all the plans that we have and not being willing to stop when there's an issue that comes up that we have a chance to speak the truth into their lives discipling our kids is really side by side work where we're bringing them alongside us throughout the day and we're interacting in the little moments our kids become like the people they're rubbing shoulders with all day the people they're spending the most time with with so this side by side work this quantity of time with them matters I've heard so much about quality time and that's also important but I think where they're spending their time who they're spending their time with all day makes a big difference William is always asking if he can help me in the kitchen if it's making sourdough feeding the sourdough making dinner so I was letting him help me with this and I had no clue that Luke was throwing the ball to Benjamin on my back until I sat and watched this on video um just made me aware of I just wonder how many times kids are doing things that I am completely oblivious to back to being interactive with our kids throughout the day um the other day one of I heard my kids arguing over something and you know sometimes it's okay to let them work it out but in this instance I heard someone say well I just don't care and in my whatever I was doing at the time I didn't want to stop but I knew that this was something worth stopping over so I stopped I went over and just talked with this child and just explained We are family we want to love each other and the words I don't care are words that I don't really want to hear you saying to a sibling and just taking that time and realizing when it's good to stop and address things and when it's okay to just let them talk things through just being aware being interactive not that every moment needs to be a lesson not that we need to sermonize over every little thing I I really do believe in giving kids a lot of free time and free play time to be bored um just Time by themselves sometimes and I I think we put too much on ourselves as moms thinking thinking that we always need to be planning something for them keeping them busy I'm not saying that at all I don't think we need to always be on but I I do sense at least in myself sometimes this distraction where I am just in the mode of what I want to get done today and I forget very easily how impressionable my kids are and how important how how much influence I have in their lives and I have to remind myself like CS Lewis said that children are not a distraction from the work they're the most important work [Music] my daughter Aton made this beautiful loaf of bread and so we decided to have grilled cheese sandwiches with pepperoni for dinner uh my husband wasn't home for dinner today so um this is something we put together and they all chipped in a third thing that I thought about and wrote down about discipling our kids is that it's asking questions and being a good listener listening to the things that they're struggling with that they're fearful of the things that are important to them the things that they really want to do I recently asked I told all three of my girls I want you to make a list of any questions you have about life what what are you excited about what do you want to know about but maybe you're embarrassed to ask what question question do you have about life ask me I want to talk about them with you I may not have the answer uh but I I want to be the one that talks with you about these things these are the conversations that I want to have and I was really surprised that the three of them were really excited about this the three my older girls I have three older girls and then the other two are a little bit younger so I was just talking with my older girls and they put a list together right away and really had fun doing this we had some great conversations we were up late one night just talking about some of these things but I think discipleship is being there and listening being aware of um what their needs are and what they're struggling with and just coming along side by side with them and helping them helping them understand life helping them to see things through a Biblical perspective and you know as I'm saying all these things it may sound like I have all these things figured out and that I do them really well the truth is that I was thinking about this and wanted to talk about this because it's pressing on me and I I can see areas in my own life where I need to be better at doing this and just be a little bit more intentional with my kids which leads me to the last the fourth thing that I wrote down about discipleship and this is the hardest one of all which is just being being a role model for them being a model of Godly character of christlikeness of um living before them in a way that we want that I want my kids to emulate what I'm doing they are watching they're watching how we respond when the baby has a blowout and messes it all over his crib how we respond when someone's fighting um what we say how truthful we are they see what's important to us how we spend our time and it makes the biggest difference who we are is what we are transferring to them your life is hidden with Christ in God when Christ who is our life appears then you also will appear with him in glory therefore as the elect of God holy and beloved put on Tender Mercies kindness humility meekness longsuffering bearing with one another and forgiving one another if anyone has a complaint against another even as Christ forgave you so you also must do but above all these things put on love which is the bond of perfection and let the peace of God rule in your hearts to which you are also called in one body and be thankful [Music] you you're Tiner M I'm six well I'm you're thank you for watching today if you have anything to add on this topic of discipling our kids I would love it if you would comment below I do one video a week on homeschooling encouragement for everyday moms if you like this content I invite you to watch another similar video that I did an ordinary day in our home school every moment for have a great week I know I to when I was four that down the sky Mom they're not they're not on this side oh good okay look at momy Benny