The 3 P's {Purpose}

If you are just popping by today and you didn't get the backstory of my 3 P's, I encourage you to head to Tuesday's post (click here!) and start there.... It'll make more sense if you do, I promise.

When you are the parent of a passel of little bitty treasures, the idea of "Purpose" can feel overwhelming and "too big" around which to wrap your sleep-interrupted, dirty-diaper-focused mind.  But as much as I hated to hear it when I was in that baby/toddler/two in diapers stage of my parenting, the years DO fly by. The days of monotonous replays of Barney, Sesame Street, and Dora (rewind, repeat) really do come to an end. And if you don't catch a hold of the Purposes of God for your kids and teach THEM how to grasp that "big idea" also, they will get stuck in their own litany of monotony, only it won't be the all-too-brief season of diaper-changing and baby-rocking. It won't be with the big purple guy and that strange little backpack. It will be with REAL.LIFE. Grown up stuff that won't grow up till they face it. I know you don't want your kids to settle for "less than" purpose-filled, God-ordained, intentional lives. But getting them there requires our diligence and our own catching hold of the purpose for which God has us parenting them. Getting our kids to the point of living fully in their big dreams and passions requires that we teach them and we pray into them the purposes of God.

Praying For Our Kids' Purpose

Ask God to show you some things about the path that He has for your children's futures. Pray for intentionality in their pursuits of His plans. Pray for that pursuit to be based on The Word of God and carried out with integrity and creativity. They have plans for their lives and He knows just how to fit them into the bigger picture of His kingdom and the niche only they can fill within that kingdom.

Pray for healthy and productive child development. Pray that the sequential stages of their development  will be productive and useful toward preparing them for the next stage and for their future growth. Each stage  of learning that our kids encounter has been put in place by God. He created them and those stages have an important function and "big picture"  purpose. It's so tempting to try and rush them through the stages, but instead, try praying them through the stage and asking God to give you a peek into what they are learning. Sometimes, you might even need to pray for a stage again, as often kids "revisit" stages for different reasons or seasons of their lives.

Pray for your children to identify their life purpose(s) in His timing and learn how to continually surrender it to the glory and the honor of Their Creator. Pray that his or her individual purpose supports and contributes well to the Body of Christ at large and to the local church family in which they are planted. Yes, planted even now as kids. We are all created to glorify The Father - and that can be done at any age.

So how about it? Let's chat again. What verses from The Word can help you key in on the purpose of your child's life?  I'm anxious to hear from you and can't wait to dig into The Word with you!