depend on the skills which these activities teach? What is a biblical
definition of success?
Psychological Adjustment
(^) Other parents strive for more psychological goals. Driven by vivid
recollection of their own childhood, they are preoccupied with Billy’s
and Suzie’s psychological adjustment. Books and magazines pander
to these parents. They promote the latest pop psychology—all tailored
to insecure moms and dads. These gurus promise to teach you how to
build self-esteem in your children. Have you noticed that no books
promise to help produce children who esteem others?
(^) How can you teach your children to function in God’s kingdom,
where it is the servant who leads, if you teach them how to make the
people in their world serve them?
(^) Some child psychologists, appealing to your own sense of being
used, offer strategies for teaching your offspring to be effective with
people (manipulation made easy). Still other experts, pandering to
your fear of over-indulging your children, promise children who are
not spoiled. Every issue of the book-of-the-month club catalog has its
pop-psychology-for-children offerings. Parents buy them by the
millions, bowing to the experts who tell them what kind of training
their children need. This is the question you must ask: Are these
psychological goals for Christians? What passages of Scripture direct
you to these goals?
Saved Children
(^) I have met many parents whose preoccupation is getting their
children saved. They focus on getting their child to pray “the sinner’s
prayer.” They want him to ask Jesus to come into his heart. They take
Johnny to Child Evangelism Fellowship functions, Good News Clubs,
summer camps or anywhere else where someone will bring him to a
decision to trust Christ.