Passing on the lamp of God's Word to our children

Here are three lessons I've learned as a mom:

1. Moms set the standard for her children.

Children are great imitators and as they say, we should give them something good to imitate. If we want our children to love learning and reading, then we should love learning and reading. In that sense, we can say that if we want them to love and obey God, then they should see us love and obey God. The formative years of our children are crucial in their development and as the first teacher of my children, I saw how important it is to lay the foundation at home.

2. Moms need to be teachable.

This is something that I personally learned from my mom. Sometimes the older we get or the more experience we acquire, the more we think that we know it all but the truth is—we don't and that's totally fine. Our children needs to see this truth in us: that mom doesn't know everything, that's why we need to ask God for wisdom. This is also a good attitude to pass on to our children as my mom passed this to me. Sometimes, we teach our children, sometimes our children teach us, and sometimes we learn together.

3. Moms cannot train their children alone.

We need God. We will also need help from others. It is an unbearable burden to try to carry all the weight of our children's welfare when in truth we cannot really control everything. What we CAN control is how much our children learn about God and how often do they see His love displayed through us.

Someday our children will make decisions on their own. We can help them make the right ones by guiding them using God's Word. I love how the Bible describes the Scriptures as a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. (Psalm 119:105)

I praise God for my mom who made it a priority to "give me the lamp", so I am passing it on to my children. Happy mothers day! 

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Sofia Shalaby Antonio is the author of Light Seeker. She is is an Evangelist’s wife, a homeschooling mom, and a servant of the King. She and her family travel all over the Philippines under National Hoops Philippines ministry to reach young people for Jesus. While she loves discovering new places and meeting new friends along the way, her ultimate desire is for young ones to find their way to the King. Thus, she enjoys teaching, mentoring, encouraging, even writing stories that teach valuable truths from God’s Word. You can email her at sofia.antonio@nationalhoops.com.