Steps 1-4 for How to Help Your Children Become Self-Motivated [Podcast #11]

Here is the second podcast in the series about How to Help Your Children Become Self-Motivated. This is part of the recording of a workshop I presented at the annual North Carolinians for Home Education Conference 2014. The first part is Foundations for Helping Your Children Become Self-Motivated [Podcast #10].

Foundations

• The ultimate goal for parents is to raise mature, Christ loving believers.
• Parenting should move from discipline to discipleship, from external motivation to internal motivation.

This episode covers the first four steps:

1. Pray for your children to surrender their hearts to Christ (Eph 3:14-21).
2. Teach your children truth from God’s Word (Psalm 19:7-11).
3. Teach your children God’s purpose for life and how everything we do fits into it (Deut 6:4-9).
4. Encourage and affirm your children (1 Thess 2:11-12).

You can return to the notes post for the entire workshop to view and download the notes or view the prezi.

I would love to hear your comments and questions, so please leave a comment here or send your question to matthew@truthtofreedom.org!

What have you learned about helping your children become self-motivated?
Please leave a comment and let us know.

How to Help Your Children Become Self Motivated

Here is the outline for my first workshop at the NCHE Conference. You can download it as a PDF and you can view the prezi I used for the presentation.

Session 4 Friday 11:00 a.m.-12:00
(Room B-D)

Foundations

• The ultimate goal for parents is to raise mature, Christ loving believers.
• Parenting should move from discipline to discipleship, from external motivation to internal motivation.

How to Help Your Children Become Self-Motivated

1. Pray for your children to surrender their hearts to Christ (Eph 3:14-21).
2. Teach your children truth from God’s Word (Psalm 19:7-11).
3. Teach your children God’s purpose for life and how everything we do fits into it (Deut 6:4-9).
4. Encourage and affirm your children (1 Thess 2:11-12).
5. Offer new responsibility and freedom in response to obedience and respect (Matt 25:14-30).
6.  Correction can take the form of discipleship, instead of discipline, when there is respect and teachability (Psalm 25:8-15; 32:8-9).
7. Give freedom to make their own choices so they can develop conviction (Heb 5:14).
8. Help your children discover their gifts, talents, and interests and free and equip your children to purse them (Eph 4:7, 11-12).

Offensive Bible Verses About Women [Podcast #9]

There are some very offensive verses in the Bible . . . to our culture. Some of the most offensive are about women. How about this one?

"Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled."
(Titus 2:3-5 ESV)

Podcast episode 9 is a continuation of episode 8, "Defeat Satan - Be a Mother." These are recordings from a teaching on Mother's Day 2013.

Defeat Satan - Be a Mother [Podcast #8]

Satan has launched a historical, worldwide attack against motherhood. Why? What's the big deal? And why does Paul mention Satan several times in his writings about women? Find out in episode 8 of the Truth to Freedom Podcast.

Defeat Satan - Be a Mother Notes

• In general, God intends for women to be mothers (Gen 1:27-28b; 1 Tim 5:10, 16; Titus 2:4-5).
   
• When women live out their role as mothers, they are less vulnerable to the attacks of Satan (Titus 2:5; Gen 3).

Fun Family Time, Great Food, and Home School Encouragement

Coming up at Cherokee Cove is the annual Home School Family Camp Out. Go HERE to see more details about this event and sign up today!

I will be teaching on the following two topics in four sessions:

How to Stop the Fighting in Your Home

Are you fed up with the ugly talk and fighting in your home? Amazingly, it is easier to be polite and patient with those outside the family than those we love the most! A major part of preparing our children for life is teaching them how to interact with others. In this session, we will apply biblical conflict resolution principles to the relationships in your home. You will receive practical tools for how to teach your children to handle conflict (and how to practice it yourself!).

How to Help Your Children Become Self-Motivated

Are you tired of working so hard to get your child to do their work or make the right choices? When will they be self-motivated? How can you help them develop this? Discipline is when parents provide external motivation for right choices (which is a necessary part of the process). Discipleship is when parents help children develop their own motivation for making the right choices because of their love for Christ. In this session, we will discuss how to make the difficult transition from discipline to discipleship. You will receive practical tips on helping your child develop godly self-motivation.

Fathers Raising Children to Maturity

On Father's Day at Highland Christian Fellowship, I taught on Ephesians 6:4 (part 1 of a series of messages). The audio is now available to stream or download on the "Teaching Audio" page.  You can also subscribe to messages from HCF as a podcast through iTunes. Here are the main ideas:

1.     Fathers raise their children to maturity God’s way, under his authority (Eph 6:4).

2.     Fathers have unique responsibility in raising their children to maturity (Eph 6:4).

3.     Fathers raise their children to maturity as an act of submissive love (Eph 5:21).

4.     Fathers can raise their children to maturity as they are directed and empowered by the Holy Spirit (Eph 5:18).

Below is the prezi I used to present this message. You can follow along while you listen, or just look around.

Workshops @NCHE

I just finished my first workshop at the NCHE Conference. It was a lot of fun; great crowd! Below is the prezi I am using for both workshops. The one I just presented, "Equipping Children for Life with Three Critical Skills" come in the second part of the prezi (the second cloud). The first part, "A Basic Educational Strategy," will be presented tomorrow at 4:50pm.

Tom Sawyer

I just finished reading The Adventures of Tom Sawyer​ again. Lots of fun! Great adventure and drama, characterization, and historical period interest. Hilariously and well written. Mark Twain did an amazing job of presenting these adventures exclusively from the perspective of a young boy, while at the same time making some decidedly insightful observations about human nature (adults in particular).

Is this a good book to include in the reading list for your children? Yes! However, there are certainly some murderous and gruesome aspects. It may not meet your standards for younger children. My strategy is to carefully allow my children to experience real life and help them understand it from a biblical worldview. 

​Another important thing to be aware of is that Tom and Huck are not operating from a biblical worldview. And their view of those that seem to be is less than flattering. There is a certain morality in the story as the boys become heroes for choosing to tell the hard truth, at their own peril, for the benefit of others! However, the book also ends with their certain intent to become "robbers".  The boys are at the time of life when playtime and reality are blurred. This might be difficult for young readers to process.

It is worth reading. It is worth letting your children read, if you are prepared to help them process it. But that should be normal life, anyway.