Spiritual Leadership for Parents Of: KidsSample

Starting With the End in Mind

What do you want? What do you really want? For just a second, set aside answers that don’t have an eternal aspect. Things like money, status, career advancement, vacation homes, or your team winning a championship, but let’s assume there are higher things that will outlast them in the end. With that filter, there still might be countless answers, but one of the most common things for parents is to set the spiritual temperature in our home. To lead our kids to Jesus the best we know how.

It's so easy to push aside what we really want to fixate on what we want right now. In the Bible verses we read from 2 Timothy 4, a wise older man named Paul is reflecting on his life in a letter to Timothy, a young leader with tremendous potential. From his vantage point, he has a clearer view of what his life has been and where it has ultimately led him. He compares his life to a fight and a race, two things that require consistent training, patient endurance, and demonstrated stamina. Now he stands at the precipice of his payoff (verse 8).

Imagine Timothy reading these words in this letter from his mentor. For a guy with most of his life still in front of him, perhaps this was the encouragement he needed to begin thinking about what would define his life when it was over, and what he hoped was waiting for him on the other side of this life.

It’s worth our consideration, too. Where is our current path leading us as a family? Is it getting us where we hope to go? Do we need to make a change in direction? We would be wise to learn from Paul’s example and begin our journey with the end in mind, seeing where we hope to finish and plotting our course in that direction starting today. Paul’s words remind us that we will need training, grit, and stamina to fight our fights and finish our races, but the payoff is better than we could imagine.

Today, take a moment to reflect on what you really want for your family and write it down. Then pray a simple prayer asking God to guide your steps and give you the stamina to get where He is already beginning to lead you.