Parents, Are Your Kids too Comfortable?

As parents we desire to protect and provide for our kids. It's a natural tendency which to a certain extent is a very good and healthy thing. But what happens when we make things too comfortable for our kids? How do we know when we've gone too far?

Michelle Anthony, in her book Spiritual Parenting, puts it this way:

"Signs of a home whose children are living in excessive comfort including laziness, ingratitude, lack of motivation, selfishness, entitlement, a critical spirit, and gluttony - among others." (pg. 122)

When we try to overprotect we are potentially trying to interfere with what God is teaching them. We see throughout Scripture that God uses trials to grow the faith of His people. Michelle Anthony goes on to explain that the by-products of such trials are, "... perseverance and mature faith." (pg. 124) Isn't this what we truly desire for our kids? How else will they learn to live in a sin-soaked world.

I'm all for protecting our kids from things that will hurt them and their faith. But there's a problem when protection becomes for the sake of comfort. There's a problem when kids are so comfortable that don't see their need for Christ. Michelle Anthony wraps up the chapter this way:

"When we really believe that what God is preparing for us in eternity is far greater than anything we could suffer here on earth, then we are free to live a life of risk and abandonment not bound by fear. A generation empowered by this mind-set will be a generation to be reckoned with - of that I am certain!" (pg. 134)

All quotes taken from Spiritual Parenting by Michelle Anthony ©2010 published by David C. Cook