Training

As you know based on my last post, I've started a routine of being consistent in my working out and time with the Lord.  I was doing p90x for a while, but long story short, I've altered that plan quite a bit and the majority of this new plan is running and hopefully getting good enough to do a 5k or something in the near future.  That said, as I've gotten a few runs under my belt I've noticed a couple of things:

- I've gotten better in just a short amount of time (I assume I'll continue improving?)
- It's hard work!

The thing I tend to forget about training myself (mind, body, or spirit) is that it is real work to start in whatever condition you're in and push yourself to grow and improve individually.  I want it to just come easily and not have to do much to achieve improvement.  Obviously, with education being my profession, I have a first hand view of students who choose to work hard or not.  The ones who work hard are successful, the ones who do not are not successful.  Simple.  With my body, I can easily see in my own life how if I work hard I improve and if I don't then I very quickly become lazy and apathetic.

Hopefully you can tell where I'm headed - it's the same in our walk with Christ.  As a Christian, God doesn't tell us to just get 'fire insurance' and that's all we're required to do.  It's a lifestyle, it's a transformation, it's work to grow closer to God in our relationships with Him.  The awesome thing about it is that while the training of my mind or body can be a very individualized experience, the training of my spirit is something I'll never have to do alone because God is right there beside me giving me strength and lifting me up as I continue to grow closer to Him.

As crucial as all of that it - to realize that I need to work at this relationship - I think it's so vital to understand the importance of starting early in life.  Just like young children can learn languages so much easier than older people or young athletes have more time to improve their abilities than older athletes, young people are so important to Christ.  He even says in Mark 10:14-15:

"Let the children come to me; do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God.  Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it."

God has placed in the hands of Christian parents the remarkable ability to influence our children for the Lord.  We're even commanded to do so in Proverbs 22:6:

"Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it."

A couple of weeks ago I went into Isabella's room to get her up for breakfast - a time I have begun to cherish more and more as she gets older - and she looked at me, smiled and pointed and simply said, "Bible."  It was the first time she had done that and I almost broke down right then and there.  It absolutely melts my heart and makes me smile the biggest smile ever to know that the first thing Isabella wants to do when she gets up - before eating or getting a new diaper, before running around or playing with her toys - is read a story out of her little Bible.

I know we're going to mess things up as time goes on.  I know we're not always going to get things right.  But there is one thing that I will die before getting wrong and that's the command of Proverbs 22:6.  If we as parents do nothing else with our lives, I'm praying that we raise our children up in the Lord because it's the best gift a parent can ever give to a child.