Our sunday school class is watching a video called, “A Case for Kids” by Paul and Tedd Tripp. Ted Tripp wrote the book called, “Shepherding a Child’s Heart”. It’s one of the best books I’ve read on child training (next to The Mother at Home). This weeks lesson was so good. I took notes to share with my daughters so I thought you might want to take a peek at them, too. 
* If we are not ‘enculturating’ our children in the things of God, they will be ‘enculturated’ by the surrounding society. (this was from last week’s lesson)
* We need to ask good questions of the child, questions that expose the heart, questions that expose the inner struggle with God and people, questions that lead to an awareness of one’s need for a Redeemer.
Five “Good” Questions:
– What was going on? (Situation)
– What were you thinking and feeling as it was going on? (Thoughts)
– What did you do in response? (Behavior)
– Why did you do it? (Heart Motives)
– What was the result? (Consequences)
* Paul said, “… the most powerful thing that you can do for your child is to build in him very early this inescapable ‘God-awareness”. How can you build this God-awareness into your child? Practice moving from the mundane moments of life to God. Example: Romans 1:20 teaches that we can understand more about God by what He has created. Use examples of his creation (sunset, sea given boundaries by the power of His Word, etc.) to teach about the attributes of God and who He is.
* Life takes place in the family, and life is pregnant with opportunities to talk about the most significant things in life… God! Look for opportunities to teach your child about God in the every day things of life.
* Influence is a byproduct of relationship. Without an intimate relationship with your child you will not have much influence. This comes by spending time talking to your child and getting to really know him. Don’t always be ‘doing’ things for your child without spending ‘time’ with your child to get to know him.
- Ex. Be thankful you have time with your child in the car alone. This is one of the many opportunities where you have his full attention to get to know what makes him tick and which ‘god’ he is serving.
* Someone once said, “The better you know your audience the better teacher you will be.”
- Do you know where your child struggles to believe the gospel?
* Situations that reveal who a child is worshipping:
-Child is screaming in the store.
He is saying, “I want to be like God in my little world. I want my own way and not God’s way.” He is breaking the first commandment to love God heart, soul and mind.
- Doesn’t like to share with his brother’s and sister’s.
This is a breaking of the 2nd commandment to love your neighbor as yourself.
- This is what needs to be exposed in a child’s heart and to help him see his deep rebellion against God and to also teach him that where sin abounds grace abounds even more and is found in Jesus Christ.
* There is a moral call to love my neighbor as myself, and it exposes the depth of my selfishness and weakness. But there is a Redeemer. And he has come in the glory of his grace and love to rescue us, so that we could be what we were meant to be, and do what we were meant to do.
This is what Tedd Tripp affectionately calls, ‘Shepherding your Child’s Heart’. I wasn’t introduced to this method of child training until my children were in their teens. I remember crying as I read the book because I had so wished I had this information when my children were young. Don’t miss your opportunity. The book is awesome and I would purchase it along with The Age of Opportunity by Paul Tripp which is for parenting teens but I think it’s absolutely necessary for parents with younger children, also. Shepherding gives the principle where Age of Opportunity gives you examples on how to relate to your child in this way.
So what do you think? Is this something new to you or have you heard of ‘Shepherding” your child’s heart before?
