Are you an Out of This World Leader for your family? Continued

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Lead Your Family Like Jesus

To Lead Your Family Like Jesus, you must align four leadership domains:

1. Heart:  Character and values you employ as you influence your children

As a leader of your family, are you focusing on what’s temporary—or on what will last?  Are you concerned about what others think of you as a parent?  Finally, don’t compare your parenting with other parents.  Comparative parenting is a trap.  It will bring pride or defeat—neither of which is good.

In The Search for Significance, Robert McGee noted that if Satan’s formula for self-worth is:  “Your self-worth equals your performance plus the opinions of others.”  As parents, it’s easy to let our pride and fear edge God out (EGO) as the source of our security and sufficiency.  Blanchard, Hodges, and Goyer provide these five tips for proud and fearful parents:

  1. Identify times when pride and fear are likely to pop up.
  2. Remember whose you are and who you are
  3. Take the “So that” test.  State why you want to make a decision for/about your child…
  4. Give up control and let God be your guide
  5. Trust Him, as Proverbs 3:5-6 says.

In contrast, everything Jesus did was about the other kind of EGO—Exalt God Only—as the object of his worship; as the source of his security and self-worth; and as the omniscient audience and judge for life decisions.  So, how do we “Exalt God Only” as parents?

  1. Embrace an eternal perspective of the here and now in light of the then and there
  2. Seek to lead for a higher purpose:  Beyond success; Beyond significance; and To obedience and surrendered service
  3. Scrupulously assess my level of trust and surrender to what I believe about God, His Kingdom, and His claim on my life and leadership
  4. Seek out the promised guidance of the Holy Spirit, the ultimate coach

Are you giving your kids the idea that pleasing others is more important than pleasing God?

EGO

2. Head:  Your viewpoint and beliefs about leading and influencing your children

For a family viewpoint, it’s important to start with your family mission.  I blogged about mine last Thanksgiving (click here to check it out).  There are four elements to consider here:

  1. Purpose:  What “business” is your family in?  Think of this as your strengths and passions—how can God use those to affect people around you?
  2. Picture of the Future:  What will your family’s future look like if you’re accomplishing your purpose?
  3. Values:  What does your family stand for?
  4. Goals:  What needs to be accomplished?

As a leader, it’s important to note that before trying to engage and influence your family in working with you to create a compelling vision, you need to be clear about your own personal purpose.

With a clear mission, family leaders can make hard decisions to make sure what they live matches what they believe.

 

3. Hands:  What you actually do when leading and influencing your children

As parents, we must make the most of our childbearing years.  Just as Jesus’ season of earthly leadership was limited to the span of a few years, so is our most active season of parenting. Here are four ways to avoid wasting those precious parenting moments:

  1. Value every day
  2. Pay attention to God’s nudges
  3. Get a mentor to help:  Who is someone you can look up to as a parent?
  4. Pinpoint your child’s developmental level

And as a parent, we want to inspire obedience, not rebellion.  Here are six tips to do that:

  1. Stand your ground—invest time & energy to withstand their challenges
  2. Don’t let fear set your agenda
  3. Tailor your tactics.  Failing to take our children’s differences into account can exasperate them without educating them (Ephesians 6:4)
  4. Model obedience yourself.  What they see is what you get.
  5. Build trust.
  6. Test for understanding.

It’s important to note that there are two parts to the servant leadership model that Jesus exemplified:  a visionary role (setting the course and destination) and an implementation role (doing things right with a focus on serving).  That’s a good act to follow for parents!

 

 

4. Habits:  How you continually refocus your desire to lead and influence your children, as Jesus would have you do

To stay on track as a parent, we need to stay close to God.  Here are five key habits that Phil Hodges points out:

  1. Solitude.  Recite Psalm 46:10 in this way:  Be still and know that I am God.  Be still and know.  Be still.  Be.
  2. Prayer.  Use ACTS (Adoration; Confession; Thanksgiving; Supplication)
  3. Studying and applying scripture.
  4. Accepting God’s unconditional love.
  5. Involvement in supportive relationships.  Name 2 people in your life who love you enough to tell you what you need to hear about your parenting.

Tricia Goyer provides these seven ideas that helped her parent more like Jesus:

  1. Have Scripture e-mailed to you.
  2. Keep a Bible open on the kitchen counter.
  3. Watch Christian sermons on the internet.
  4. Keep a devotional book in the bathroom.
  5. Have a Bible Study time with your kids.
  6. Ask your spouse to be your Bible reading partner.
  7. Join a Bible Study.

Finally, cultivate the habit of praying constantly.  Then, periodically review your progress in leading your family like Jesus.  Celebrate it and redirect your efforts when you think you’ve lapsed.

Ultimately, we all need to trust Jesus as our parenting leadership role model.  When we do, we’ll make Him smile—and help our children fulfill their heaven-sent potential…

For us, that’s Out of This World Leadership, helping our children shoot for the stars!