the BLOPE

Deuteronomy 6:4-9 gives us our mission from God as parents: “Hear O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.” I want to quickly unpack this job description for parents into 3 action steps that you can do today to begin passing down faith in your home: 1) Put it in your Heart First - “these commands…are to be on your hearts” You can’t give away what you don’t have. You can’t inspire someone else to do something unless it inspires you first. If you want your teenager to be fueled by their faith than make sure that is what is fueling you. ACTION STEP:

unsplash-logo Helloquence Do you have a will? You know, the paper that they pull out when you die to see who gets your stuff. The process of preparing a will is not fun. The lawyer asks you, “If you die who will you give your stuff to?” You say, “Give it to my spouse.” The lawyer quickly responds, “and if your spouse dies who will you give your stuff to?” This goes on and on until it seems like everyone is dead and you realize the lawyer is just trying to get you to add him into the will! “What if Aunt Bertha dies? And your cranky neighbor? And the postman, then will you finally give me your stuff? When you write a will you figure out how you are going to leave behind your stuff, but you are more than the sum of your stuff, right? So let’s write a different kind of will. What values are you going to leave your teenager? What will you teach them about what is right and wrong in this world? What will your teenager know about faith? bcsm wants to h