"quality time" with your kids?

Marc Driscoll on Quality Time

Big thanks to Kyle Carlson for posting this on Facebook.

"You don't know when the quality time (with your kids) is going to surface, so you have to be attentive and aware as much of the time as possible..."

Driscoll goes on to point to the example of Jesus as His work was "inconvenienced" by some kids that stumbled upon the scene. How convicting for me personally as a father!

"So Jesus is attentive, He's present, and He makes them a priority. He disrupts His plans, He allows them to interrupt His day, and He makes them a priority."

Some questions I'm asking myself right now:

Am I "interruptable"?

Am I attentive to my wife? my boys?

In the midst of all that I've got going on, are my children a priority?

I believe there's a balance between structure (i.e. a set "family discipleship time...which by the way I'm failing miserably in right now!) and a fluid approach to connecting with your kids as you capitalize on certain moments. But the goal is always the same for a Christian parent: Are we pointing our kids to Jesus? Are we helping them wrap their minds around God, around their relationship with Him and around life's questions? The "church" doesn't exist so that parents can farm out their discipleship responsibility. Let me just encourage you: You are the best discipler your kid will ever know! Seriously. You spend the most time with them, you know what makes them tick (for the most part) and you (hopefully!) care about them more than anyone else in the world. All it will take is a little intentionality, a little attentiveness and a willingness to have your stuff interrupted. But man is it worth it.

And the principle is the same in all of life and all of life's relationships. When we pray, "God give me eyes to see and ears to hear", let's actually mean it! Be ready for God to answer that prayer as He reveals opportunities.

Convicted,

Jonathan