Parenting Blog

 

Having our third child, I’ve been thinking about how we are going to save for him.  We had saved for our first two kids, but with three kids expenses have gone up.  Rather than think about how am I going to do this in a short time, I started thinking, what would it take to do it over his life?  I know so many people who never save anything for their kids.  Or, when their kids get in high school they start to panic about how to save for college.  So, I thought I would share my conclusions with everyone.

 

Just like many other things, if we plan ahead and make a little bit of sacrifice, we can achieve great things.  I thought I would give you the math to show you what you could realistically accomplish.  

 

If you save $1,000 per year (per kid), until they are 18.  At 7% interest, which is even fairly conservative historically, they will have about $36,000 at age 18.  That could be a nice chunk toward college (some may think that’s not enough, but it could get them through if they start at community college).  Or, if college gets paid for some other way, like a scholarship, it’s a very nice savings start, for emergency fund, even retirement.

 

Let’s say they don’t have to use that money on college, and they never save again.  At 7% interest, they will have almost one million dollars at age 65.  At 9% interest, which is more in line with historical investment returns, that $36,000 would be almost 2.5 million dollars at age 65.  Wow.

 

If your not starting from their birth, you will obviously need to save more each year, if you want the same outcome.  But, better to start now than many years from now.

 

I think this makes saving for our kids seem doable.  Of course it takes some sacrifice, but I can make some lifestyle adjustments to save $1,000 per kid, per year.  If you don’t think you can manage that, what can you manage?  Something is better than nothing.  Maybe you can save $1,000 this first year, divide it among the kids, and next year try to up the goal.

 

Put the money into an account under their name, so you are not as tempted to dig into what you have saved for them.

 

 

 

 

A couple days ago, our kids were playing with their money.  One of our kids took a $5 and gave a $1 back to his brother who doesn’t know the difference.  Mom saw it and came to me about it.  We told him that was deceptive and he basically stole from his brother.  We wanted some kind of punishment that related to the misconduct, but we couldn’t think of one.  So we gave him the standard discipline for lying.

Then I went in to do my quiet time.  I am reading through Leviticus.  And low and behold, Leviticus chapter 6, which I happened to be reading that day, deals with a person who deceives someone and/or steels.  The prescribed punishment is, “He shall make restitution for it in full and add to it one-fifth more,” Leviticus 6:5.  I was so in awe.

I called the boys in the house, sat them down for a quick Bible study.  My son, who had done wrong, immediately saw the connection, and became ashamed.  We told him that since he deceived his brother out of $5 (really $4, but it seemed it was $5 to him), he had to give him the five back, which he had already done, and give him $1 more.  He was pretty bummed about that.  It was just the kind of related punishment we were looking for.

The point I want to make is, if we are not in the Bible ourselves, we are not going to know what to teach our kids.  It won’t always be that you open to a passage that deals with that day’s issues.  But everything we read in there does related to life. 

A couple weeks ago I was doing Bible time with my boys and we were learning over several days in Corinthians about giving to the poor.  Just a couple days ago my son got some money, and I asked him what portion he wanted to give to God’s causes, and what specifically he wanted to give it to.  He set aside half and said, “I want to give it to the poor.”  I think he remembered that from our Bible lesson a couple weeks ago.

God and God alone knows what is right and good.  We can’t teach our kids right and good apart from learning it from God.  It starts with being in the Bible ourselves.  Then, make it a next step goal to get your kids in there.  How about this? 

Do your own reading. 

Decide what the main point is. 

Maybe pick a verse that explains that main point the best.

Then get your kid(s) and do a brief Bible time with them.  Read the one verse.  Make the main point.  And talk with them about it.

 

 

 

Do you need to increase your care and concern for your kids?  If you don’t have it naturally, pray for it.

 

Do you need to really follow God yourself, so your kids get a better model to follow?

 

Do you need to stop assuming everything is going to be okay because your kids are in a Christian home and around the church, and do you need to take a more active role in training them?

 

Have you abdicated primary responsibility for our kids to anyone else, and need to take that responsibility back?  Maybe, you have abdicated primary responsibility for their discipleship to the church, and need to take the responsibility to teach them the Lord’s ways yourself.

 

Do you need to reestablish influence in your kids’ lives?

 

Do you let your kids do what they want, without correction, and you need to change that?

 

Do you need to put more boundaries in their lives to protect them from evil harm?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are a couple resources for parenting.

 

We've been talking about a parent's responsibility to teach our kids the Bible.  Focus on the Family has many resources that can help you disciple your kids.  If you are not sure what to get, give them a call and a resource consultant will help you.

 

Review the content of movies, in theaters and on DVD, before you let your kids watch them.  Here is a helpful resource, Plugged In Online.

 

 

 

Here is the most recent activity I did with my kids during quiet time.  It was so simple, but my kids wanted to do it again and again.  See the previous blog for more.

We read about Jairus’ daughter, who had died by the time Jesus got to her, but Jesus raised her from the dead, from Mark 5.  One of my sons went in and laid on the bed and played dead.  One of my sons played Jesus and was across the house.  I played Jairus, and went to get Jesus.  I told him, “My daughter is sick, near death.  Will you come heal her.”  We went to the bedroom together.  I said, “Oh no, while I was gone she has died.  My son playing Jesus said, “Get up.”  My other son popped up, smiling.  We celebrated how amazing it was.  Since there were three main characters, we did the activity three times, each time switching roles.   

Today we just read the story and did the activity.  So tomorrow I'll probably come back to the story and talk more about the implications of it - how Jesus has the power to raise people from the dead, how he will raise us from spiritual death to eternal life (as apposed to back to this life) - and ask them questions.

 

 

 

In my sermon this morning I mentioned activities that I make up after I read a passage in the Bible to my kids.  Here are a couple samples of the kinds of activities.  Sometimes the activity is very simple, like the Jesus calmed the storm activity.  Sometimes the activity is pretty complex, like the Red Sea activity.  The complexity depends on how much time we have and what kind of an idea I can come up.  Sometimes I do the Bible story one day and maybe do a simple activity, then I think of something more elaborate I can do, so I’ll plan and execute the elaborate activity for another day that week.  Most of the time our activities are simple.

 

Jesus calmed the storm (Luke 8:22-25)

I laid on the floor on my back.  I said, “I’m the boat.”  I had one of my smallest son sit on my chest and the other one sit between my legs. 

I said, “You two can take turns playing Jesus,” and we decided who was going to be Jesus first.  I said, “Okay remember Jesus was sleeping.”  So, he pretended to sleep.  I told my other son, “You are one of Jesus’ disciples.”

I started waving my arms and legs and said they were the waves.  I sprayed water on them from a pray bottle.  I said to my one son, “Disciple, you better wake up Jesus.”  So, he said, “Jesus wake up.”  My son playing Jesus came alert and said, “STOP!”  And I immediately stopped my waving and spraying. 

The first time we did the activity I had to prompt them what to do, but as we repeated the activity, the kids knew what to do.  They wanted to do it again and again.

 

God leads the Hebrews out of Egypt & through the Red Sea (Exodus 13:17-14:31)

We made a sea and a cloud with the art paper.  I cut three pieces of art paper about 5 feet long.  I laid two of them out on the pavement in the back yard and had my kids paint/roll blue paint all over them.  While the kids are painting, take the third piece of paper, grab the ends together and twist them like a twist tie, shove those ends inside the end of the PVC pipe, then crumple the paper into a cloud-like formation.  I then took the two painted-blue pieces and laid them side by side in a narrow passage between our play-set and fence, in the back yard.     

We stood at one side of the yard, away from the blue-painted-sea paper.  I asked my kids, “How did God lead the Hebrews through the desert, by day?”  They said, “A cloud.”  I held up the paper-cloud on a stick and said, “Okay, follow the cloud.”  I lead them all over the back yard, and pretty close but not yet to the blue-painted-sea paper.  Once you do the next part, you won’t be able to walk very far.

(this part is optional if you are fearful of fire) I asked my kids, “How did God lead the Hebrews through the desert, by night?”  They said, “Fire.”  I lit the cloud on fire.  They naturally stood back, but were thrilled with it.*  “Okay, follow the fire.”  I lead them the short distance to the blue-painted-sea paper. 

They stood in front of the two pieces of blue-painted-sea paper, at the crack between the sheets.  I got on the other side, and used my PVC stick to gently keep them from trying to come around it.  I asked my kids, “How did God get the Hebrews through the Red Sea?”  They said, “He opened it.”  I said, “Yes, He parted the Red Sea, so they could walk through on dry ground,” as I parted the two pieces of paper.  My kids walked through. 

I then had my kids put on soldier helmets and said, “The Egyptian soldiers tried to chase the Hebrews through the sea.”  My kids started to walk between the paper again, but this time I picked up the pieces of paper and ruffled them around their bodies and head and said, “Oh, the soldiers drowned.  God did not let them through to chase the Hebrews.”

* I don’t mind using things that would typically be seen as dangerous or scary, because I would rather have my kids experience those things with me there to talk them through it, then have them mess with them on their own and not know the dangers.  Kids love fire.  They are almost for sure going to mess with it at some time if they can.  So, I would rather do some controlled things with fire that they can enjoy, but then be able to talk to them about the dangers of fire and fire safety, which I did at the end of this lesson.  And we put water on the burnt paper, together, to make sure the fire was out.