Guests: Johnny Farr and Nick Bellamy

As we look to equip you as parents for meaningful and intentional spiritual training, pointing you to good resources and books is a practical way to prepare you to better train your children “in the fear and admonition of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4). We will also look to address other media avenues, such as movies, to help equip you, the parents, for those quality conversations around the dinner table or on your drive to and from school.

Our first resource that we are reviewing and strongly recommending is Parenting: 14 Gospel Principles That Can Radically Change Your Family by Paul David Tripp.

From the book Parenting:

Introduction

Good parents don’t always produce good kids, and parents should constantly be asking themselves where they get the set of values that tell them whether they have “good” kids or not.

Chapter 1 Calling

Principle: Nothing is more important in your life than being one of God’s tools to form a human soul.

Chapter 2 Grace

Here’s the humbling conclusion that God, in grace, led me to: I am more like my children than unlike them - and so are you!

Chapter 4 Inability

Parenting is not about exercising power for change in your children. Parenting is about your humble faithfulness in being willing to participate in God’s work of change for the sake of your children.

Chapter 5 Identity

Principle: If you are not resting as a parent in your identity in Christ, you will look for identity in your children.

How do you know if you’re putting your identity on the shoulders of your children?

1. Too much focus on success.

Chapter 6 Process

Principle: You must be committed as a parent to long-view parenting because change is a process and not an event.

Chapter 8 Authority

Do you humbly own the rebellion of your own heart as you deal with the rebellion of your children in a way that causes you to exercise authority with patience and grace?

Chapter 9 Foolishness

Principle: The foolishness inside your children is more dangerous to them than the temptation outside of them. Only God’s grace has the power to rescue fools.

Chapter 12 Control

Principle: The goal of parenting is not control of behavior, but rather heart and life change.

Chapter 14 Mercy

Principle: No parent gives mercy better than one who is convinced that he desperately needs it himself.