Well let me share whats been turning in my heart the past year.
“What is perfect character?
It is the ability, in a separate entity with free moral agency, to come to the knowledge of the right from the wrong—the true from the false—and to choose the right, and possess the will to enforce self-discipline to do the right and resist the wrong.”
It is your responsibility—your DUTY—to teach your children the absolutely vital, all-important, lifelong pursuit of character development.
Character forms the greatest defense that a human being can have against every conceivable pitfall, threat, roadblock and hurdle that life can throw at him
With this in mind I feel the area of Teen Dating is corrupting good character.
I'm shocked at the number of parents that let their children date as early as 11. I know that children have crushes and all that at that age but let's face it, they are still babies at 11 or 12. To each his own, I guess.
I know its not easy to work on good character when everything and everyone is doing something else. Now I am not stating that girls dating at 11 or 12 have bad character.
I am focusing only on my child in today's post.
Character development is huge at this time for a young girl and part of her development is to learn healthy boundaries. I feel many girls are beginning to date way to early. Just my opinion.
I know many moms will say "the girls will do it anyway if you do not let them."
Well that is the lesson we're learning at the Baxter house.
The Baxter Boundaries
This hard boundary is teaching my daughter about TRUST and HEALTHY CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT.
She may break the rules and step over the boundaries we have for dating (at this time) several times but each time I begin to see her heart break over the trust she broke between her and dad.
Today before school she cried when something was revealed again... but she said this, " I do not want my dad to never trust me again, I am sorry."
That was the point God wanted us to see as a family.
We may hang here for several months in our family as we
Learn to trust, love, obey, respect and mature all while failing to obey a boundary.
While doing my morning reading in LUKE 22:31 it reminded me of Simon Peters failure...Let me share the verse,
“Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift all of you as wheat. 32 But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.”
I thought of it like this.... "BRITTNI, BRITTNI, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat, But I your mom have prayed for you that your FAITH will not FAIL and when you have turned back, strengthen your friends and family."
The facts are:
1. We all Fail
2. We all need boundaries
3. We all test and break the boundaries
4. We all need someone to pray for us
5 We all need a foundation of faith to pull us back
I think Peter can best be described as a volcanic, explosive and impulsive individual.
He was ruled by his heart and not his head.
He was quick, impetuous; a man who must express his feelings, experienced difficulty keeping his mouth shut, acted according to the way he perceived things even when his perception was incorrect. He acted first and thought later.
Why does this sound like me?
The point I feel God really gave me this morning as a mother to a tween-age girl is that I must still keep the boundaries.
Not fall into the rut of letting her do it because she will do it anyway syndrome.
The boundaries she will FAIL just as Peter did but look below how Jesus loved and taught Peter.
Jesus, with supernatural vision, looks at Simon Peter's imminent failure and his recovery before the failure had even taken place.
Jesus looked beyond temporary brokenness toward a permanent wholeness.
He told Simon about the downward way up.
He articulated a strange route to spiritual power.
Regardless of how the world tries to convince us otherwise, our best learning comes the hard way.
BOUNDARIES TEACH WISDOM
Wisdom is often born out of weakness. Insight comes through pain, strength is gained through suffering.
We rise to spiritual power by way of peculiar paths.
WHAT PECULIAR PATHS ARE YOU FACING TODAY WITH A CHILD?
WHAT NEW OR OLD BOUNDARIES HAVE YOU ENFORCED?
BROKEN BOUNDARIES LEAD TO CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT AND WHOLENESS
Pray this verse today parents for your child,
I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.
LUKE 22:31
PRAY FOR YOUR CHILD TODAY IN WHATEVER SEASON THEY MAY BE IN. I ALSO ENCOURAGE YOU TO HAVE BOUNDARIES.THIS WORLD IS TO DANGEROUS AND TRICKY TO JUST LET THEM TASTE IT ALL AT ONCE.
THEY WILL NEVER LEARN ABOUT BOUNDARIES IF THEY HAVE NEVER BEEN GIVEN ONE.
Thanks again Jesus for helping me in the tween age dilemma!
