Are Manuals THAT important?

Have you ever tried to put something together or use something without looking at a manual?  Have you ever gotten so frustrated when the product is not functioning the right way?  If you have visited this sight before you have come across photos from Elizabeth Madaia photography.  I had the pleasure of seeing her start off her business with a simple camera to the day she invested in a seriously expensive camera—with more features.  There was a problem though, her business was taking off but she couldn’t do what was needed because the new camera was not working the way she wanted it to.

I recalled having a photo shoot with her when she thought her brand new expensive camera was broken; Liz was getting so irritated.  She was so upset and couldn’t believe it.  She spent all this money on this expensive camera just for it to break.  To her surprise it wasn’t broken at all.  Liz had admitted that she really didn’t read the manual to its fullest, so she was not using her camera to its fullest capacity.  There were even features she was told it could do but wasn’t clear as to how to do it.

How much better is it for us to have a manual when parenting?  When I became a mother for the first time, it was nice—the first few days—however, there was something in me that was waiting for Joey’s (my oldest son) real parent to come pick him up.  He wasn’t a camera, a shelf from IKEA or a brand new iPhone.  He was not just a life that will exist in this world and the next, but he was going to be the father of a future nation. He could be a husband–God willing–a grandfather.  The way I raised him and his siblings, respond to them and relate to them, will forever shape how they see themselves and the way they see life.

Where Is the Parenting Manual?

I knew that my husband would play a big part, but as a mother, how did I parent them without a manual?  I didn’t have good examples of parenting.  Doesn’t everything come with an instruction manual anyway?  Doesn’t everything have a customer service number to call when something goes wrong?  Why didn’t parenting have a number to call when you were lost or confused?

Well, whether everyone believes it or not, we parents do have a manual.  We do have a basic instruction in this life.  Sometimes following the decrees and the commands in this manual is harder and more time consuming than just the idea of following the crowd or the majority.  Raising Kingdom Kids is a hard job and not everyone get it.  Who wants to sit there with a big set of rules and instructions?  Everyone wants instant gratification; however when you are raising royalty you have to be willing to see pass your own discomfort and inconvenience.

Let’s look at Proverbs 22:6

 Start children off on the way they should go,
and even when they are old they will not turn from it.

Look at the path you are putting your kids on.  Some people look at this verse for Christian’s who raise their kids in church.  But you can’t put your kids on a path that you are not on yourself.  So what path are you on?  Is it sprinkled with love, peace, joy, structure, stability, faith, consistency, or is it with uncertainty, anger, fear, rejection, neglect, envy or bitterness?   Your children will follow you wherever you go because they automatically think that the path you are on is the way in which they should go.  Sadly, even if you tell them to go in the other direction they will follow you anyway.  You can scream at your child to be better than you, but it doesn’t work that way.  Sometimes the path you put them on will have a sprinkle of good and bad.

Passing the Baton

Parenting is a baton you pass in this race of life.  When I was listening to Tony Evans in his series of Raising Kingdom Kids he made such an amazing point, “When you have children you are passing a baton to them so that they can start their own race.  If you don’t pass the baton the race is over and you have lost.  You are passing to them something to run this race for.”  So what are you passing to them?  Whether we believe it not, we are in a race called life.

He was so right. Our life is not necessarily a sprint, but a marathon.  Whatever you transfer to them will either give them the energy to keep running or it will weigh them down.  I did not have the pleasure of meeting my father-in-law, but when I started going to my husband’s home church, I found out that Manuel Angel was a legend.  The impact that he made on his community, his church and his family had out lived him.  No matter what Manny and my mother-in-law Toni, put their hands to, it was blessed.  They had favor wherever they were.  These parents passed the baton of favor to their boys.  Not only did they have favor, but they taught their children how to love and serve people with pure humility.

Both my brother-in-laws and my husband are three of the most sacrificial men that I have ever met.  Their strength is the love they have for people and their weakness is also the love they have for people.  My husband has placed all of my kids on a path of love and compassion for people; so they enjoy serving and being there for others.  This is why it is important to examine the baton you are passing to your kids and make sure you are running the same race you want them to finish.

This race must be run with respect and fear of God.  One thing that is in our manual (The Bible) is the need for healthy fear of God.  Some people don’t have a healthy fear of God so they place their child on a path where God is not revered and respected.  Tony Evans likened this to a parent who doesn’t teach their kids the importance of respecting electricity.  Electricity is something that we have grown to need and love in order to live and thrive in this society; still you quickly respect electricity when you put a metal fork in the socket holding a wet cloth.  The very thing you love, need, use to thrive can kill you if you don’t respect it’s power.   Our God is good but not safe.  He is love but dangerous.  As parents we must teach our children to respect God and his ways, but again we can’t put them on path to respect God when we aren’t on it.  Don’t scream for them to respect God, go to church, resist the things that are against God’s rules if you do not respect it yourself.

It’s never too late to start over.  What if you look at the path you are on and the baton you are passing and don’t like what you see?  Great parenting is when you see that something you may be doing is not working and be willing to adjust for the good of the next generation.  Take small steps.  Consider some small things that you can start doing that will not send your child into shock.  Zechariah 4:10 makes a statement worth thinking about.

“Don’t despise the days of small beginnings…”

Everyone’s “days of small beginnings” will be different.  I know of friends who have made changes like: the music they allowed in the home, they stopped watching certain movies, were more aggressive with attendance in church, they reduced the amount of times that they visited friends and family who were not supportive of the change, they stopped saying destructive negative things and started saying uplifting positive things, also they added prayer into their routine.  What does your small days look like.

Practical Thinking

When you decide to let God have his way in our lives we go from not having a manual to having EmMANUEL.  Small beginning starts when we look in the manual.  These are many benefits of looking at the instructions

1. It tells you how to use every piece.  When you use your rely on your own understanding, you are guaranteed to leave things out that you feel are not necessary to the design of your child but will later regret when things are falling apart.
2. It tells you what the end result will be.  Not all shelves look the same.  Not all dishwashers are the same.  There are different models and your child is as unique as it gets.  Don’t rely on what others have done to determine the structure of your child.
3. When you don’t read your manual to the fullest, you won’t get the most out of it. When you talk yourself out of read your word, you don’t get the most out of life,  and your kids don’t hit life at their fullest potential.
4. Lastly, the manual tells you what to do if something is broken and needs to be replaced. Just because you put something together perfectly doesn’t mean that there won’t be repairs and up keep.  As your child grows, the thing they once held on to may no longer be suited for them.  There needs to be a replacement or fixing and if you still don’t refer to the manual down the road, you will break something that was in good condition before.

Weekly Challenge:

Read Deut :6:6-9 look at some things that God said to do.  Look and see if there are some things that you can improve on.  I would also encourage you to also purchase the book from Tony Evans, “Raising Kingdom Kids.”  There are so many good nuggets inside for parents at every stage of life.

Comment below to start a discussion or if you need extra help please feel free to email us.  Follow us on Instagram and Facebook @throughthewinters.