Introduction

The story is told about a young wife who routinely cut off the ends of the ham before she put it in the oven. Since he had never seen this done before, her new husband wanted to know why. “Well, that is always what my mom did so that is how I learned to cook ham.” The young bride soon became curious and asked her mother about it. “That is always how my mom cooked ham so I learned it from her.” Mom couldn’t stop thinking about it so she called her mom who told her, “I learned it from my mother.” This prompted grandma to quiz her mother. “Well, dear, I didn’t have a pan large enough to cook the ham so I had to cut off the ends so it would fit.”

This is a good example how much children learn from watching, listening to, and immitating their parents. Language is another example. We all learned to talk from hearing our parents speak and eventually immitating it. We learn vocabulary, syntax, and even our accent from our parents. If they spoke English, we learned English not Chinese or German, or French, etc. This is also the foundation God has given us for discipling our children.

These words I am giving you today are to be in your heart. Repeat them to your children. Talk about them when you sit in your house and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Bind them as a sign on your hand and let them be a symbol on your forehead. Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your city gates.”

Deuteronomy 6:5-9

In order to carry out His directive here, we must first know what “these words” are. In other words we must be in His Word. Unfortunately, our responsibilities as wife and mother often monopolize our time. It is important to make sure our time with God does not go by the wayside and that we are making conscious choices about the best way to raise our children to be Godly, able to live in the world but not be of it.

I once had a college professor who was adamant that it was more important to teach lessons that went deep and anchored the knowledge in our students’ minds. If we just spread information out on the surface and moved on without nurturing it, the students would not internalize it. As a young mother I found this premise useful for myself. I learned it was not as important for me to read several chapters of the Bible as it was to spend time meditating on a short passage and gleaning from it all that God had for me to learn.

This blog contains short devotions designed to help you maximize your time in the Word, anchor its precepts in your heart, and diciple your child. Each lesson has a practical application for you and an example how you can disciple your child. A key verse will be provided that you can hang on your refigerator, mirror, dashboard – anywhere you can see it thoughout your day. Practice reading it out loud so your kids hear you, but don’t stop there. Our conversations with our kids are vital.

We can learn an important lesson from the generations of moms who all learned to cut the ends off the ham but didn’t know why. Children learn to imitate what they see, but they understand the thought processes when they hear us talk it out and become better equipped to think through a situation and make wise decisions.