A Faith-Based Approach to Parenting in a Changing World
Part One of a Four-part Series
Parenting is one of the most challenging endeavors you will ever face. What other arrangement do you enter into with fear and trembling that is quickly replaced by awe, wonder, and love? This remarkable journey includes investing the next 18-20 years of your life nurturing and tending, shepherding and directing, funding and losing sleep over, to ultimately release and, potentially, have no additional return on your investment. Did I leave out the part where one minute you’re adored and the next you’re avoided? And there are those inevitable moments when they say, at midnight, “Oh, by the way, I have to have a project ready for the science fair in the morning. Do you have any ideas?” Not to mention the times they ask, “Have you seen my other cleat?” as you start out the door to the soccer game.
Generally speaking, any good parent’s goal is to help the child reach adulthood where they can be productive members of society. Raising tiny humans to be responsible, resilient children, and ultimately, responsible, resilient adults is no easy feat in itself. Add to that the desire of Christian parents to pass on their beliefs as a part of their faith journey compounds the weight of the responsibility. The good news is that there are skills that can be learned if you take the necessary steps along the way. There is a secret key that makes this all work. That key is the relationship between you and your child.
In the arena of child development, resilience in children tends to refer to a child’s ability to deal with and adapt to challenging situations, such as bullying, stress, or trauma. It includes maintaining emotional health while dealing with daily setbacks and unexpected struggles. Factors that contribute to resilience in children include, but aren’t limited to, parental support, positive relationships, a sense of control, having hope, and the ability to regulate emotions. Parents who have a strong relationship with God know that He is an ever-present source for each of these necessary traits and skills. A Christian parent who draws daily from God’s supply would certainly want those resources available to their child, thus increasing their desire for the child to adopt the parent’s faith as their own.
Through this and the following three articles, we will walk through how you, as a parent, can build this vital relationship, starting with an infant, that will help you to raise resilient children who adopt your faith as their own. But what if your child is past the infancy stage? Is it too late for them and for you? Absolutely not! There are steps you can take to build this relationship no matter the age of your child. What if your child is an adult? Relationship is still the key – even if your adult child has boxed you out of their life – and it’s never too late to begin. And the role of grandparents should never be overlooked. How do you build those vital relationships with your grandchildren, especially if they live in another state? Whether you’re anticipating your first-born or your home is filled with love and chaos with kids of varying ages and stages of development, keep reading, and you will find some answers in this four-part series on Raising Resilient Children Who Adopt Your Faith as Their Own: A Faith-Based Approach to Parenting in a Changing World.
The statistics from reports on the status of children staying in church when they become adults aren’t encouraging. In fact, they can be quite disheartening. For example, “two-thirds of church-attending teenagers drop out as young adults and many of those rarely, if ever, come back.”1 However, another study shows “When church leaders imagine young people turning away from Christianity, they may picture a college student being convinced by an atheist professor or an older high schooler getting a driver’s license and using their newfound freedom to leave church behind. In reality, the secularization of the next generation may look more like a 14-year-old watching YouTube in their room.”2 Additionally, most young adults who grew up in religious households, and yet, identifying as nonreligious in their adult years “lose their faith while under the supervision of parents who believe that they are successfully transmitting their religious values.”2 Consequently, “if you wait until a teenager heads off to college or starts their career, you’re already running behind.”1
Other research shows that “among today’s adult evangelical Protestants in the US, 72% came to their evangelical beliefs before the age of 18. In fact, half came to their beliefs between the ages of 5 and 12.”3 The same study showed that the greatest influence in evangelicals coming to Christ were one or both of their parents.3 Parents, this tells us you should never underestimate the importance of your faith and your influence in the faith development of your child.
Since that is what research shows, what can a concerned Christian parent do to help their child navigate the complexities of daily life and to develop a daily walk with God and a Christian lifestyle in today’s environment? How do you raise a resilient child who adopts your faith and your values when they become old enough to make choices on their own?
Let’s get into some things that can help you navigate your way through this challenging melee of confusion, stress and fear. Before we think about the child, we must start with you. The first foundational truth is – You can’t pass on something you don’t possess. Therefore, you must have a mature, or maturing, faith of your own. Clarify your own beliefs and base them on the truths of God’s Word.
When that highly anticipated day arrives, you will already be on a good path. As a helpless newborn, your child is totally dependent upon you for every need to be met. While caring for their physical necessities can be overwhelming for sleep-deprived parents, don’t forget the spiritual component. While you’re feeding and rocking your infant, you have the perfect opportunity to pray aloud with and for your baby. Make praying aloud with them and for them as much of their normal routine as it is for them to hear you giving instructions and saying, “I love you.” As you sing sweet lullabies, add to that, songs of your faith – things that nourish your soul while you pour your love and care into your little one.
As your little one grows, or if your child is already dealing with schoolwork, the second critical step is to put into practice what you believe. Be intentional about sharing what you believe (the truths of God’s Word), why you believe it, and how it informs your activities and choices on a daily basis. Your child needs to see this lived out in front of them every day. Stated simply, how does your child know what you believe? The answer is simple: by your actions. Daily live out your own beliefs in practical ways. Make this such a natural part of your daily existence that there is no difference in your “idealized self” and your “real self.” Don’t be one person at church and another person with your after-work friends or at home. The writer of the book of James says it this way, “. . . faith, if it does not have works [to back it up], is by itself dead [inoperative and ineffective].”4 What reason would any child have to internalize their parent’s faith if they don’t see it making any real difference in daily life?
We need to live out our faith in front of our children from early in the morning until late at night. There’s no difference in the home persona vs. the church persona, or the work persona, or the ball-field persona. You have to live out your faith in all these situations. This means you are real and authentic, and this is something that grows increasingly important as your infant grows through their childhood into their teenage years. Children, especially tweens and teens, can see straight through hypocrisy. You’ll never out-maneuver them. They’ll spot a fake every time. So, eliminate those behaviors before they become something you regret for eternity.
In the Old Testament, the writer of Deuteronomy 6:6-7 says, “These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.”5
This is the guide for us today. If you begin when your child is an infant, you have a grace period to grow into this as your child grows. This matters when they spill their milk, when they lose their cleats, forget their science project, and are learning to drive. There’s no “off-time” for living what you say you believe. It’s vitally important if you want your kids to adopt your stated beliefs as their own.
And finally, the third vital step is to be approachable and available. This means that on a daily basis you’re consistently building a relationship where it is okay with your child to talk with you about anything. As idealistic parents, we want to dream that our children will get all their information about the world and the way it works from us. For example, when they’re young, we want to think they will be asking us questions about issues related to dating, sex, alcohol, and drugs, but if you haven’t made yourself available to them all through their younger years to listen when they want to talk – even at times that are incredibly inconvenient for you – they’re not going to begin opening up to you with these questions when they’re teens. You have to lay the groundwork for that all along the way. (We’ll dig into this more in the next article.)
In summary, here are the three important take-aways that you can focus on from the time you bring your little sweet-smelling bundle home from the hospital until they hit those stormy teen years.
1. Have a maturing faith of your own.
2. Be intentional about living out your faith on a daily basis.
3. Be approachable and available.6
In the next article, we will dig more deeply into practical ways to be intentional about passing on your faith and more of what is involved in being approachable and available. In the third article, we will discuss their transition from childhood and elementary into middle-school, junior high, and high school, and how to navigate those waters. In the final article in this series, we will delve into the transition from high school to college/work years and adulthood. We will also talk about the incredibly important role grandparents can play at every stage in the life of their grandchild.
If you have more interest and want to go deeper into these subjects, go to our website HopeSpillsOver.org where you will find detailed information about training under the Parenting tab. Be sure to check out Guiding Your Child’s Spiritual JourneyTM, PassagewayTM, and Transitions.TM
1. Aaron Earls, LifeWay Research Article, https://research.lifeway.com/2019/01/29/4-ways-to-avoid-the-church-drop-out-danger-zone/
2. Aaron Earls, LifeWay Research Article, https://research.lifeway.com/2023/10/04/the-next-generation-is-leaving-the-faith-earlier-than-you-realize/
3. GreyMatter Research & Consulting, https://www.infinityconcepts.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/The-Spiritual-Journey-Downloadable.pdf
4. Scripture quotations taken from the Amplified® Bible (AMP), Copyright © 2015 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. lockman.org
5. Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.comThe “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™
6. Guiding Your Child’s Spiritual Journey-Foundations of a Child’s Faith Copyright © 2004 by Charles Redding
