Family Discipleship The Watching World

As Christians, we are called to a life of ministry, and it all beings in our homes. In today’s podcast, we learn from Bill and Karen Ward, authors and parents of five adult children, as they discuss the importance of family discipleship.

Having not grown up in spiritually foundational homes, Bill and Karen were driven to create a biblical environment for their own children. As they submitted to God and His way for their family, they found themselves changing into the parents they wanted to be. Karen was called to homeschool all five children, and Bill learned about his purpose as a father, that he is responsible for his family, and for shaping his children to be presentable to Jesus one day.

The key to good parenting, according to this wise couple, is to be active in your personal walk with God. Having Him deal with your issues so that you don’t adversely affect your children while bringing them up. And when you do mess up, making it clear that you need repentance, and modeling your relationship with God in front of them, so they will see that you are genuine and hopefully choose to walk with Christ for their whole lives as well.

No family is perfect, and when there is chaos in the home it’s the parent's job to take ownership of the mess. Bill humbly asks for forgiveness from his children when things go wrong at home, and this is something they have kept with them their whole lives. Seeing a parents’ love for Jesus above all things is the best gift you can give your children.