"Lest Though Forget"...On raising Children...

Last night was the first night of our marriage seminar. It was lovely=) We got to get all dressed up, drop the kids off, and enjoy a fun, relaxing night together. It was a fantastic. Bro. Dave Hardy and his wife Grace are the speakers this year, and last night we heard out first lesson on the home.
He mostly talked about marriage, of course, and it was great, but the thing that stuck out most to me was a comment he said that his wife has said to him. It was something along the lines of "I think mothers forget in raising chilren that their main goal is to produce children that are choice servants for Christ", and that was just so convicting to me! He was saying that for some reasons these days we are just content if we can have our children grow up to just finish school, and stay off drugs...and how true is that!?
In the back of my mind I also have that goal, but sadly, most days that is not my absolute focus, and that was a sad realization to me. Most days I feel accomplished enough if I can just get them up, dressed and fed; homeschool, play time, rest time, fed some more, bathed....well, you know, all the things that we moms do every day, that I am just plain dropping the ball on what matters most!!
Yes, I do teach and train and discipline, but I find that I have lost the vision of not only raising well-behaved children, but raising Godly children. I do not want that. Anyone can raise a smart, well behaved child, but it takes a Godly Christian wife and mother to raise a son or daughter that is going to grow into a "choice servant" for Him!
I think many times we as Christian mothers just go through the motions. We pray before meals, we do devotions with them, we bring them to church 3 times a week, we teach them about the Bible at home, but why?? What is our main focus? Are we doing it because it is the right thing to do? Are we doing it because we want them to have a lot of knowledge so we can look good? Or are we truly focused on the fact that we only have 18 short years with them to really train them to be servants for Christ?
We can easily put on a show for others, but our children know us and watch us more that we even realize...and above and beyond all of our teaching, they are going to learn how to be a servant of Christ by watching us. Is mom reading her Bible? Is mom praying? Does mom have the joy of the Lord in her life? Does mom live what she "preaches"? Is mom a gossip? Is mom a complainer? Does mom show the love of God in her discipline? Is mom witnessing? memorizing Scripture? The list can go on and on!
But, as I heard last night, and many times before, the thing children are watching most is the way mom reacts to dad. In the Bible it talks about the Husband loving the wife as Christ loved the church. Marriage is the prime biblical example of Christ and the church. So we need to be, we MUST be, modeling that for our children. They need to see that picture to understand why we serve. I know for me, I do things for my husband because I love him, and he does the same for me. And that is what our children need....to see that we serve out of love, not duty.
So, therefore, we need to teach our children to love, I mean really love Christ. If they grow up seeing us serve the Lord out of duty, then they can easily rebel and quit serving Christ because they don't want to anymore. But, if we instill in them a genuine love for the Lord and who He is, they will want to always serve Him with their lives. It is when that true love is not there that the heart begins to wander.
A marriage is not going to fall apart when both spouses are 100% dedicated to serving each other, not out of fear or duty, but out of love.  It is when we allow that selfishness and pride into our marriages that we begin to crumble and let Satan in. It is that selfishness and pride that our children see and begin to lose the picture of Christ and the church. Each time we argue with our husbands, defy them, planting our feet and refusing to change, the picture Christ put before is gets more and more blurred for our children, and they miss out on the beauty of what it was supposed to be.
Every single moment of every single day is a time when we can be teaching our children of God's love for us. We need to be talking with our children and letting them see how much we really love Him. I have been reading in the Old Testament and I love Deuteronomy 4. I see how many times it talks about parents teaching their children about all that Christ has done for them in the past. Reminding them how God has always been there no matter what, "lest they forget".

 ^9"Only take heed to thyself, and keep thy soul diligently, lest thou forget the things which thine eyes have seen, and lest they depart from thy heart all the days of thy life: but teach them thy sons, and thy sons' sons;"
The mercies of the Lord are something we can never teach our children enough. We need to be telling them all of the things He has done for us in the past and in the present and all He has promised us for the future. We need to be teaching them that God is REAL! A true relationship with Christ is not something we get overnight, but something we work on every day, just like our marriage. It is knowing God and learning more and more about Him every day. It is talking to Him and listening to Him and responding when he shows you things to change. Just like with our husbands.
And I truly believe that when we as mothers have that kind of love for the Lord, our children will have no choice but to notice that and want that for themselves. They will come to Christ and draw close to Him, not because we tell them they have to, but because they want to. There will come a day when we will not be there to tell them to read their Bible or pray or that they have to go to church....will they still do it? Do we even do it?
I don't even know if all of this makes sense, but I just do not want to be resposible for missing the mark with my children. The Lord gave them to me, and like Hannah, I need to give them back to Him, and raise them to know the goodness of the Lord, so when the choice becomes theirs, they will follow in His steps....because they know nothing else, but serving Him and loving Him with all of their heart.
Deuteronomy 6
^5"And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.
 ⁶And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart:
 ⁷And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up."