Sermon Tone Analysis

FOR SUCCESSFUL CHILDREN

Raising Cane with Kids – Part 1

THE SPIRITUAL FOUNDATION

FOR SUCCESSFUL CHILDREN

April 30 - May 1, 2011

We’re beginning a new series this week on relationships; specifically we’re going to look at the family.

I’m calling this series “Raising cane with Kids: What wise parents know and do.”

You may be saying, I can check out of this because my kids are grown or I don’t have kids and never intend to have kids.

So for the next couple of weeks around Mother’s Day we’re doing a series on family relationships.

The whole church will be studying this together.

You may be saying, I can check out of this because my kids are grown or I don’t have kids and never intend to have kids.

You’re dead wrong!

You’re absolutely dead wrong.

In the first place, you may be ninety years old and your kids are seventy, but they’re still your kids.

And for the rest of your life you are a parent.

There are things that you do at every stage.

I used to think that once my kids got out of the house my parenting skills were over.

Forget that.

You’re a parent the rest of your life.

On the other hand, if you don’t ever intend to have kids or whatever, you still need children in your life.

You may be eighteen years old, you may be eighty years old; you need kids in your life for two reasons.

One, kids keep you young.

The moment you stop having kids in your life, you get old really fast.

And number two, you need kids in your life because children are God’s way to teach you unselfishness.

When a mom or a dad gets up in the middle of the night to take care of a kid, they’re not doing it because they like to get up in the middle of the night.

They’re doing it out of love.

It is teaching you unselfishness.

So whether you are a mother or a father or you are an aunt or an uncle or you’re a grandmother or a grandfather or you are simply an adult friend, you need kids in your life.

You need to either get involved in the children’s ministry, the student ministry or become a mentor, after school program, fostering or some way you need to get kids in your life.

They did a study of at-risk kids one time in New York City and Washington, D.C. to find out what is it that kids in inner city, what keeps them on the right path or not.

They discovered that the difference between whether a kid makes it in life or doesn’t make it is the presence of a single adult that cares for them.

A caring adult makes all the difference in a child’s life.

What they discovered was this: It doesn’t have to be a parent.

It just has to be a caring adult in that person’s life.

You can be that parent, that adult, that mentor, that big brother, that big sister or whatever.

We have many, many ways for you to be involved in that here at Southpointe.

I realize that here in our church we have many young families.

This is a young family church.

So I thought, when I was a young dad I hadn’t the slightest idea.

Nothing in life prepares you to be a parent.

So I thought, when I was a young dad I hadn’t the slightest idea.

Nothing in life prepares you to be a parent.

Everybody agree with that?

You just do it.

It’s not like you know how to do it and then you become one.

No. Nobody knew how to do it.

You learn how to do it while you’re doing it.

Everybody agree with that?

You just do it.

It’s not like you know how to do it and then you become one.

No. Nobody knew how to do it.

You learn how to do it while you’re doing it.

So I thought I’d show you right up front, as we start this series, ten things not to do as a parent.

Don’t do this as a parent.

That’s not a good dad model for your children.

Here’s another one.

Don’t do this – try to wash your baby and the dishes at the same time.

That’s what guys do when wives are off at the women’s retreat.

Don’t do this: Don’t let your baby eat out of the doggie dish.

Don’t do this: This is in Thailand.

Here’s a baby washing with a python.

I know that’s not going to happen in America, but in case you ever move to Thailand, don’t do that.

Don’t let the older child mark up the younger baby with a marker.

Don’t ask the older brother to babysit with a marker because this is what you’re going to get.

That’s not good.

Don’t do this: Let your baby get the food for themselves out of the refrigerator.

Don’t try to feed a baby with your toes.

This guy is incredibly lazy.

He’s trying to feed his son with a bottle in his feet.

Don’t do that.

Here’s another one: Don’t give them cigarettes and beer.

You don’t want to do that as a dad.

Don’t let your kids get a ticket!

That’s real important, because if he’s speeding it’s on his record for life.

Most important of all: Don’t pierce them.

Wait until they’re old enough and then if they want to get pierced on their own that’s their decision; but don’t you do that in advance.

We’re going to look the next few weeks at the different needs of children – emotional needs and intellectual needs and relational needs.

But obviously we’re going to start with the most important – their spiritual needs.

I’ve actually heard guys – parents – say this, “I’m not going to force my religion on my kids.

I’m not going to teach them about God.

I’m not going to force them to go to church.

I’m going to just let them find their own way, find their own path.”

There’s a word for that: stupid.

That’s the most insane thing I know.

Some people are so open minded their brains fall out.

That’s just dumb.

Because this is the most important thing in life.

It’s more important that your kids know God than that they succeed in business.

It’s more important that they know God than they be popular.

It’s more important that they know God than they know how to hit a baseball, because none of that other stuff is going to last.

God did not create your child to simply go to school, get a job, retire and die.

God created your child and created you to know him.

If you miss that, you miss the whole purpose of your life and their life.

So if you’re going to get anything done in your kids’ life, whether they ever go to college or not, whether they ever do anything else or not, you need to make sure that they get to know God – because that is the only thing that is going to last forever, for eternity, for on and on and on – they need to know that this life is preparation for the next.

So we have to give our kids a spiritual foundation.

It is the most important task of a parent, far more important than teaching them how to dribble a ball or whatever else you want to teach them.

That they get to know God, their creator.

Giving my kids a spiritual foundation is important for three reasons.

They’re the three verses on the top of your outline.

The first reason is it’s my responsibility as a parent.