~To Love their own Children~

The week I was studying "to love their children" 1 Corinthians 13, a passage on charity, kept coming to mind.  I decided to look at the word charity and apply it to my relationship with my children.

"Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned."

1 Timothy 1:5

~ We're given a command to not only have the motions of love towards our children, but have it come from a heart full of love.

It says in 1 Corithians 8:1 that charity edifieth.  Edify means to encourage moral or spiritual improvement.  Do our actions encourage our children to be morally or spiritually better?

"Notwithstanding she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety."

1 Timothy 2:15 

Sobriety means solemnity or deeply earnest.  One question that comes to mind when reading this passage is saved from what? We know that giving birth does not save us from our sins or eternal separation from God, so what could it mean?  The passage talks about the woman being deceived. So in context of this passage, she shall be saved from further deception or falling into sin if she submits to her role of wife and mother and does her job in faith, in CHARITY, in holiness WITH EARNESTNESS. If we take our job seriously, we also won't swallow the world's lies of needing a career for fulfillment or fall into the sin of wasting time.

1 Peter 4:8 says "Charity shall cover the multitude of sins" ...we all make mistakes in parenting.

"-Though I speak with tongues of men & angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.

-And though I have the gift of prophecy, & understand ALL mysteries, & ALL knowledge;
-and though I have ALL faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity,

I AM NOTHING.
-And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor,
-and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charitym, it profiteth me nothing."

1 Corinthians 13:1-3

~I think that's true in our relationship with our children too. We could do many great things, be the wisest person in the world, but unless we LOVE THEM we will LOSE THEM.

What is charity?  The Bible gives an excellent definition:

Charity
~suffereth long (Am I patient...long suffering...with my children?)
~is kind
~envieth not (Parents have to be careful of this with their children too.)
~vaunteth not itself (Are we boasting about how good 'we were' at such and such? Instead of being proud of the level they are at? )
~is not puffed up
~doth not behave itself unseemly
~seeketh not her own (Am I more concerned about me time, my clothes, my nails...instead of of my children and taking care of my home?)
~is not easily provoked (even with a lack of sleep)
~thinketh no evil

~rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth (faithful to discipline when necessary, but remember to love and be excited for them in the good)
~beareth all things (100 diapers, 3 wet beds/bedding, broken candles...all in one day!)
~believeth all things
~hopeth all things
~endureth all things."

1 Corinthians 13:4-7

We are not going to win and keep our children by our knowledge or wise words, but by our love..."Charity never faileth" but prophesies, tongues & knowledge shall all fail, cease & vanish away. "And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity." 1 Corinthians 13:8, 13

God commands that us to love our children "that the word of God be not blasphemed".  Are you blaspheming the Word of God?

Previous commands we have studied:

Introduction to Titus 2
To Be Sober
To Love Their Own Husbands