Parenting. Again.

I've just been thinking today about parenting, and how vastly different are expectations of our children are than those of just a few generations ago.  Justin and I have been watching the John Adams (HBO Miniseries), and those kiddos knew how to work!  I feel bad sometimes asking them to pick up after themselves (oh, bless their hearts, they hardly get any downtime, all of that hard work focusing in school...).  This is crazy!  I have to remind myself that I am not doing my children (or their future spouses) any favors by not giving them responsibility and...not actually holding them responsible for doing what they are supposed to do.

This has been brought home on a spiritual level by reading the book of Proverbs and stumbling upon a Ted Tripp (the author of Shepherding a Child's Heart) conference podcast available here.  On a side note, the resurgence website has some great podcasts to browse through if you are ever looking for something to listen to that gets you thinking.  Anyway, I've only listened to a little bit of the first talk, but Tripp reminds us that all of humanity will worship something, including our kids.  And it is our job as parents to continually hold up God in all of His glory, majesty, and wonder as the only being worthy of our worship.  This is difficult to do when we parents are continually chasing after our own little idols; this reiterates our need to steep ourselves in God's word and prayer.  Our kids are capable of memorizing more scripture and retaining more knowledge about God than we realize; we are not doing them any favors when we expect less of them.  And we do them a disservice when we allow them to while away the hours chasing after things that will never satisfy.