Sheltering Your Child’s Heart (Part 2): Avoiding Danger

If ever there was a way we ought to shelter our kids, it’s the way in which we protect their hearts. In fact, we can expose them to much of the world, but we better slow down when we sense them developing a love for the world. To put it another way, much of our aim in parenting (and sheltering our kids) is to help them apply 1 John 2:15-17:

¹⁵ Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. ¹⁶ For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. ¹⁷ And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. 

There are few parenting goals more crucial than helping our kids live out this passage. We want our kids to love God, not the world. Therefore, we must continually ask ourselves: what will cause our kids to grow in their love for the world, instead of in their love for God?

The first step in doing this is knowing our kids. We need to think through their specific desires and inclinations so that we can know how to practically protect their heart (I wrote about that in the last blog post). However, there’s also some standard dangers that affect just about every kid and that’s what I think is worth considering today.

Starting with…

1. Friends

We all know peers have a huge impact on who we are. But I don’t think we really get just how much. If we did, we’d be so much more proactive in this arena. 1 Corinthians 16:33 says, ^“Do not be deceived: ‘Bad company ruins good morals.’” In other words, we need to not be deceived—if our kids hang out with less-than-awesome friends, it will likely have less-than-awesome results. Even if we’ve instilled so many good character qualities in our kids, just a little bad company can mess it all up.

So how do we protect our kids from bad friendships? Obviously we can’t control who interacts with our kids every moment of every day, but we can control the extra investments our kids make into their various friendships.

To do this well, we need to be aware of the people in our kids’ lives. This may mean volunteering in your kids’ classrooms. Maybe it means inviting kids over to hang out at your house so that you can get to know who’s who. This might mean you work on better communication with your child to learn from them who is having an influence (this is always a good goal). Suffice it to say, we should be “in the know” when it comes to who’s influencing our children.

Another strategy is intentionally investing time into certain friendships. Your child has a limited capacity for meaningful friendships, so loading them up with quality friends will naturally lessen the exposure to bad friends.

For example, your child will certainly have classmates you have no control over, but you have plenty of control over who they play with after school. You don’t determine who’s in their small group at church, but you can say no to hangouts and sleepovers with the questionable characters. You don’t decide who’s on their soccer team, but you can decide how much soccer will be a part of their social life.

The point is: we need to thoughtfully and prayerfully help our kids engage in good beneficial relationships…and we need to limit exposure to friends that will have a less-than-awesome influence (Psalm 1:1).

2. Worldly Messages

A second danger to consider are the messages of the world. Worldly messages have always had the ability to draw away unsuspecting souls. And surely the age of technology hasn’t made this less of a danger. It’s everywhere our kids look— in shows, movies, books, music, school, textbooks, ads, social media, etc. In fact, it’s extremely hard (if not impossible) to avoid. But we must be on guard if we want to protect our kids’ hearts.

So what messages are we to be concerned about? Basically, any ideas and values that are antithetical to a Biblical worldview. Anything that describes life different from God’s viewpoint. Anything that causes us to think about things that are not pure and honorable (Phil. 4:8). Anything that lures us into loving the world instead of loving God. And there is a whole lot that fits in this category! Just to give a few examples, think of messages related to materialism, or sexual promiscuity, or ideas that promote selfish living, disrespectful behavior, crude jokes, immodesty, etc.

Basically, our kids are surrounded by the idea that they can live however they want; or rather, that they should live however they want. And sadly, any idea to the contrary is deemed outlandish and outdated. If we want something better for our kids, if we want them to not just follow the ways of the world, if we want to protect their hearts, we need to protect their eyes and their ears.

Will this limit what they can watch on TV? Absolutely.

Will this make picking out books more difficult? Definitely.

Will you need to be diligent about monitoring their music? For sure.

Will you need to be aware of their internet use? You better be!

Your child’s view of life is being formed while they are in your home, therefore you need to do all you can to point them the right direction. I imagine before technology it was at least easier to help kids see life from God’s perspective— but here we are in the 21st century, and we need to work with what we have. And it’s no time for laziness. Our kids are either going to be indoctrinated by the world or indoctrinated with the truth. It’s one or the other. You’ll decide which one by what you allow in.

3. Themselves 

Lastly, let’s consider the danger of, yes, our very own children. We could shelter our kids from all kinds of influences, but danger still lurks in one subtle and sneaky spot. In fact, we could throw out the TV, listen only to Christian music, turn off the internet, hang out with only like-minded families, and we still would not be safe. Because we don’t have to look further than our own hearts to see what draws us away from God.

We all have our own ugliness, selfishness, and stubbornness to fight. If truth be told, our sinful nature is our most dangerous enemy. Without the help of bad friends and worldly messages, we already want that which is contrary to the will of God. Thus, there’s a sense in which we should shelter our kids from themselves. And this a task we should take serious from the youngest of ages.

On a practical level, this starts with teaching our children God’s ways from day one. It means we up the training as soon as they defiantly yell, “No!” (Or do so inaudibly with their actions). It means we teach them all about their sinful nature so they can put off sinful actions and learn how to live God’s way.

In other words, don’t expect your efforts in parenting to only involve protection from what’s “out there.” You have your work cut out for you within the walls of your home – and as countercultural as this sounds, we must  protect each child from “following their heart,” because God tells us their heart will lead them astray (Jer. 17:9).

So how can we avert the danger? 

As obvious as it is, it must be said: we can work tremendously hard to protect our kids from spiritual danger, but it doesn’t mean they will fully escape it. In fact, they may run headlong into danger. Nevertheless, it’s still our job to carefully set up safeguards.

In fact, picture literal safeguards on a road — a feature such as “guardrails”. These are said to “prevent vehicles from leaving the road and hitting obstacles like cliffs or trees.” Guardrails sound like a pretty good idea and they’ve probably helped many drivers. And yet, there are those who will display their foolishness and fail to benefit from the purposefully placed safeguards. Nevertheless, we all know the guardrails were not a failure, they were actually quite necessary (accidents only heighten our realization of this fact).

Therefore, let us confidently put into place our parental guardrails. And without a doubt, these 3 categories of life are a good place to start: 1) Think through our kids friendships; 2) Be aware of the messages coming at them; and 3) Remember the sin within their hearts that leads astray.

Ultimately, do whatever you need to do to prioritize the protection of your child’s heart. It will feel like you are sheltering them, and you are. You need to be. Protect the heart. ‘

 

Come back for the final blog post in this 9 part series…

1. How Much Should We Shelter Our Kids? 
2. The Art of Strategically Sheltering
3. Sheltering Your Child’s Mind (Part 1):  What to Say and When
4. Sheltering Your Child’s Mind (Part 2): Get Talking!
5. Sheltering Your Child’s Daily Life (Part 1): Strengthen Their Character
6. Sheltering Your Child’s Daily Life (Part 2): How to Expose them to Temptation
7. Sheltering Your Child’s Heart (Part 1): Ruthlessly Protect
8. Sheltering Your Child’s Heart (Part 2): Avoiding Danger
9. Making Decisions: Protecting and Preparing the Next Generation