02.08. CHAPTER 04 - SPENDING TIME WITH OUR CHILDREN

CHAPTER 04 - SPENDING TIME WITH OUR CHILDREN Our children must be first priority in our lives as long as they are at home. We must never leave the bringing up of our children in the hands of their grandparents or their Sunday-school teachers. God has given that responsibility to us mothers first of all, because we brought them forth and we spend the most time with them at home.

Therefore, we must never neglect our children for the sake of pursuing our profession or a career, or by excessive visiting of relatives and friends or by any other form of social activity. When my children were at home, I found it better to avoid attending most social functions, for their sake. I never regretted such self-denial, for the time saved thereby was time well invested with my children. But when God brought needy people to my home, I would set everything aside and seek to help them out. And then God took care of my children.

Now that all my four sons have grown up and are away from home, I find that I have plenty of time for visiting people and other social activities. So I would encourage you to wait for God’s time for everything.

Once we are married, our husband, our children and our home should have topmost priority in our lives - in that order. We will have to sacrifice many things if we want our married life and our home to be happy and if we want our children to grow up aright. But it is well worth it in the long run.

It will be very difficult for us to give full attention to our children, if we start working - even if it be only in a part-time job. We will return home in the evenings, from such a job, tired and weary, and find ourselves getting easily irritated and upset with our children over little things. Many things can then go wrong in the home. We will find that our children also tend to become more naughty and stubborn, when they find Mummy herself in a bad mood frequently!!!. It is a full-time job to be a mother - especially when the children are small and of school-going age. We mustn’t therefore take on more than we can handle at such a time.

We should do everything possible to attend the meetings of the church along with our children. Thereby we set a good example for them. But if at times, we are unable to go to some meetings because our children are sick, we should not feel condemned. At such times, our children may be crying in secret, and their unspoken cry may be, "Mummy, please don’t leave me alone now." When children are sick, they need the assurance and comfort of a mother more than anything else. So we shouldn’t leave them in the care of others, at such times. One day they will thank us for the happy home we provided them, even if they never know how many sacrifices we made for their sakes.

Even if we are bedridden, we can still be good mothers to our children at home. We may not be able to attend many meetings perhaps. But our fellowship with the Lord can still be unbroken. There are many Christians in Communist prisons who cannot attend any meetings at all. But they are gems whom the Lord is polishing - and He will display them to the whole world one day. We mothers too can be such gems for the Lord.

We must take an interest in everything related to our children. If they have some function in school or if they are taking part in some sports event, we should go and watch them participate in it. By such actions, we can win the hearts of our children - for they will see that we are interested in the things that they do. On holidays, we can play indoor games with them and talk to them about the things that interest them - and not just the things that interest us. We must talk to them individually and pay attention and listen to them when they talk to us. Then they too will pay attention to us when we say something to them.

We should take an interest in their academic studies too. If they don’t understand something, it is no use scolding them. We should try and study that subject ourselves and explain it to them. If that is beyond us, then we should get someone else to help them. We should not plan social visits at times when our children should be studying. Neither should we be occupied with entertaining visitors at times when our children need our attention. Teaching our children will involve a lot of sacrifice on our part and we will certainly have to deny ourselves a lot of socializing if we want to do it right. But we will not regret it when we see our children grown up and doing well in life.

Many mothers find it a real problem getting along with their teenage children and getting them to share their problems with them. One reason could be that those mothers were so busy working and entertaining friends when their children were small, that they had hardly any time to spend with their children then. Now the tables are turned and their teenage children have no time to spend with their mothers!!

We need to win the confidence of our children when they are small itself. But if we failed to do that then, let us seek the Lord and try to do so at least now. It is never too late to start trying. We should never give up hope.

Let us never forget that our children are God’s special gifts to us, and He tells us concerning each child of ours, "Take this child and nurse it for me ... and I will give you a reward" (Exodus 2:9). Our children must grow up realising that they are valuable and precious to us. They must taste God’s goodness from us mothers first of all. Then our homes will be what God wants them to be - and God will be glorified.