You model to your kids what matters to you

When our children were younger one of the annual fixtures on our calendar was Faith Camp, a summer family camp hosted by Kingdom Faith church. One particular year our church planned a summer youth camp and, as youth leaders, this required our attendance and therefore that of our kids.

One camp per year was fine but two wasn’t something my wife and I had factored in. Typically it was one week at Faith Camp and then a week’s seaside holiday.

The youth camp was non-negotiable so we presented our plan of skipping Faith Camp that year to ensure we avoided spending two weeks of our summer under canvas. The reaction from our kids to this proposal was not what we had expected. To say that they were mortified would be an understatement. Over the years they had not only grown spiritually at Faith Camp but they’d made some great friends who were on the same spiritual trajectory. They weren’t going to miss it for the world, so two weeks under canvas it was!

Here’s the thing. Having benefited from spiritual growth opportunities provided by our church and various Christian ministries prior to having children, when our son and daughter came along we made the decision to do the same for them. And Faith Camp was just one such decision.

Having said that, we didn’t go to church or Christian events just for our kids but for ourselves as well.

As the heading to this article suggests, we model to our kids what matters. Our spiritual growth mattered to us and this needed to look like something to our kids