D.A. Carson once said that students do not learn everything you teach them. What they do learn is what you are excited about. They learn what you emphasise and they learn to organise their own thoughts around those things.
The same is true of our own children. If what excites you and what fills your conversation is mystic spirituality, church politics, or money or career, then your children will conclude those are the truly most important things.
Your kids may or may not pick up on your love for the gospel. But what they will almost certainly pick up on and invariably imitate are the things you get most excited about. The things around which you organise the rest of your thoughts.
Once our children have grasped the gospel it’s tempting (and easy) to move onto other things. Exciting things. Work, family, soccer, geometry, end-times prophecy or getting that degree. And, once these things have moved into the centre, we begin to organise our thoughts around them.
In other words, if the gospel doesn’t organise our thoughts, something else will soon step in and fill the void. And that something will be the thing we get excited about. It will also be the thing that our kids learn to get excited about.
Are we excited that Jesus has come into the world and died for our sin? Are we excited about the prospect of “serving the Lord with gladness?”
Are we excited about the promise of eternal life that Jesus purchased with His own blood?
Are we excited about Jesus? Do we delight in Him? Is He our reference point in all of life? Does His word organise our thoughts? Do we long to know Him, and does that longing organise our choices and actions as we move through the world?
What do You Want to Read About?