Getting our ducks in a row involves setting our priorities in proper order. #1 on that list is to give our spiritual life the attention that it needs. #2 is making your relationship with our spouse as important as it’s really supposed to be. It just makes sense that #3 would be to work on our responsibility as parents.

Being a parent is one of the greatest blessings that we can experience in our lifetime. Children are a ‘gift’ of the Lord. I’ve often said, and I totally believe it’s true that the love we have for our children is exactly like the love the Father has for us. We don’t love our children because we’re supposed to; we don’t love them because it’s the ‘noble’ thing to do; we don’t love them because it’s right; No, while all those things may be somewhat true…..we love our children just exactly like the Father loves us…..because He can’t help it!!

This is not a conclusive treatise and I’m far from an expert on parenting but I have learned a few things in my 38 years of being a dad. Some of  those things I’ve learned the hard way….by doing them wrong first. Maybe I can pass along a few tips so you won’t have to learn them that way. 

Everything we’ve done down through the years, we’ve done as a family…..I mean the ‘whole crew’! That’s one of the things that I think we really got right! We hardly ever missed any activities that our kids were involved in. That’s quite a challenge when you have as many kids as we had! There were a lot of days I’d come home from work to find a note from Julie that she had gone to one of the kid’s soccer games. I’d head out and make a baseball game of one of the the others. Those things, I think, are really important!

We all have to work for a living but our jobs are never more important than our children. It’s a challenge but we need to learn to adjust our lives so we’re able to spend quality time with our kids. We’ve done a good job in showing and telling our kids that they’re loved. We’ve disciplined them. We’ve tried to release them so they could each be the person the Lord wants them to be. All those things say loud and clear, “I love you”!