Habit

"Thanks to my research related to child development and spiritual growth, I have become convinced that the spiritual war occurring in individual lives is pretty much won or lost by the age of thirteen.  What parents do with their youngsters prior to the teen years is of paramount importance to the Kingdom of God on earth."

- George Barna

Revolutionary Parenting

"More, habit is inevitable.  If we fail to ease life by laying down habits of right thinking and right acting, habits of wrong thinking and wrong acting fix themselves of their own accord."

~Charlotte Mason

Everyday I am reminded of the consequences of wrong habits and how right habits are a blessing.    Frequently I am told, "they are just being teens" or "he is only nine."  However, their actions have caused sorrow and grief to this mama's heart. In Proverbs we are told, " Even a child is known by his doings, whether his work be pure, and whether it be right."  EVEN a child is know by his or her actions. Being diligent to nurture and admonish is exhausting yet absolutely necessary for the child and for the parents.

When you have confidence and evidence that your children love the Lord and seek to obey Him it brings joy.
3 John 1:4"I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth"

It brings joy not only to me, but to my children who obey and have established right habits.

Children who have established wrong habits do not know the joy of the Lord and as the Bible says they bring heaviness to their mother.
Proverbs 10:1 "The proverbs of Solomon. A wise son maketh a glad father: but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother."

"Parents, so you wish to see your children happy?  Take care, then, that you train them to obey when they are spoken to, to do as they are bid...teach them to obey while young, or else they will be fretting against God all their lives long, and wear themselves out with the vain idea of being independent of His control."

~J.C. Ryle

 Do take care, for even a child is know by his actions and consequences are faced by more than that child.