Christian Parenting: 21 Ways You Can Disciple the Heart Of Your Child Towards The Lord

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What side of the sink do you wash your dishes in? (Hang with me! I promise washing dishes has something to do with how you can disciple the heart of your child.)

I wash on the left hand side. Always.

Rinsing happens on the right hand side. Always.

You see, my mom and dad washed dishes on the left-hand side and rinsed on the right-hand side my whole life. And their parents did likewise.

In all honesty, I never thought about it. Until I married my husband ten years ago. The first night in our newly wed apartment, he gallantly offered to wash dishes for me. And he proceeded to wash them on the right side of the sink! *GASP!!!*

That moment helped me realize how much we pick up from our parents without even knowing. My parents never intentionally set out to train me to wash dishes on the left-hand side of the sink yet here I am, 32 years into life still washing dishes on the left-hand side.

What do your kids pick up from you?

If your kids are anything like mine, they are complete sponges. There are stories of kids who watch their parents groan as they stand up and pretty soon the little toddlers are groaning when they stand up too. It makes for some cute home-videos to share with Grandma but more importantly it highlights how much it matters what we model to our kids.

Which is why we as Christian parents need to set intentional habits that model a strong relationship with the Lord. These habits do not earn us or our children their salvation. Only faith in the work of Jesus’ death on the cross grants us forgiveness for our sins.

A vibrant Christian faith is filled with habits of relationship-building with our Lord. These are habits that can be hard to put in place as an adult. It is much easier for a child to learn to daily study Scriptures than it is for an adult to start the habit in their later years.

The ultimate area Christian parents should want to model to their kids is what life submitted fully to Christ and lived in complete surrender to Him looks like. We model our heart attitude to them first and foremost. Then we model the actions that our heart attitude shows. 

Our children will not develop of love of God’s Word if all they see is us complaining about how long our five minute Bible study in the morning takes. But they will be more likely to desire to study Scriptures if they see us eagerly pouring over a section of Scripture even on the busy days. This doesn’t have to look like hours of quiet study. Think about how often you grab your phone for a quick peek at emails or social media. Try grabbing your Bible and studying it in the “cracks” of your day. Kids will notice that you always make time for that.

Let’s Get Intentional

Now, don’t get me wrong, as a Christian I should want to do a lot of things and work to live a self-controlled life following Christ in all I do. But that becomes a much harder calling when their are kids watching you. all. the. time. This requires a lot more intentional decisions on your part. And a lot more asking of forgiveness when they see you mess up. Christian parenting is so stinking humbling!

My prayer is that this list will be an encouragement to help you come up with intentional ways to disciple the heart of your child.

Not all of these are ideas I use. Some come from friends or family members. Certain ideas will work for your family. Some won’t.

Be flexible and stay faithful to daily showing up to model a Christ-centered, set-apart walk with God to your kids. The results are in God’s hands. You are simply called to do your part.

 

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Bible-Centered Ways You Can Disciple The Heart Your Child

The best to places to start in the discipleship process with your kids is to read the Bible together and pray. Let’s look first at ways to help your kids grow in their knowledge and love of the Scriptures.

 

Study Your Bible Daily

More is caught than taught. Several years ago in a Bible study I attended a lady there shared that everyday she watched her Grandma rise early and open her Bible to read. This young lady decided it was worth to study the Scriptures because she witnessed her grandmother’s faithful morning Bible reading.

Before we can disciple our kids we ourselves need to be working towards it in our own lives. Daily Bible study is a great place to start. Pick a reading plan that you can stick to and set a time to read each day.

Disciple the heart of your child by growing in your own love and knowledge of God’s Word. Only when they see us esteem God’s Word as truth will they want to know His Word for themselves.

 

 

Read The Bible To Your Kids Daily

Separate from your own Bible study time, find a set time each day to read the Bible with your kids. Teach them from Scriptures. Don’t assume that because they heard a story once at church that they will remember that Bible story.

Scripture is meant to be read over and over again. Relish it. Help your kids develop a life-long habit of learning from God’s Word. Begin by finding an age-appropriate Bible for their own use. Also, be sure to read to them from your own Bible at times. Keep a Bible handy to look up something through out your day as you talk.

Related Reading: The Best Bibles For Kids And Teens

 

 

Create An Environment Conducive To Personal Bible Study

Give your kids the chance to want to study their Bible on their own. Teach them to read well and help them find the right Bible for their reading level.

Provide a comfy spot away from the noises of the world with good lighting. Place a basket or a nightstand or a step stool or whatever you have one hand to contain their Bible and maybe some study tools like highlighters, a Bible journal notebooks, pens, and a set of Bible maps.

Kids will often mimic what they see us do. Make a space that will invite them to study Scriptures just like they see you do.

 

Let Them Ask Questions About The Bible

Kids questions are tough. As you disciple the heart of your child, prepare for the fact that they will ask questions!

They want to know some weird stuff at times. Welcome those questions. Set aside time for those questions.

If you want, provide them with a special journal to let them write down questions when they read their Bible. Bring out that journal when you travel or as you eat a meal and address a question. If you don’t know an answer, look it up.

Still can’t find an answer? Go ask a pastor or older Christian friend. Our kids need to know it is okay to ask questions about what they read in the Bible. More importantly, let them know you are the safest person to bring those question to as well.

 

Prayer-Centered Ways To Disciple The Heart Of Your Child

The Bible is God speaking to us. Prayer is our response to Him. Allow your kids many opportunities to see you grow in your communication with God through prayer.

 

Pray Throughout Your Day

Our days are filled with highs and lows. Pray your way through your day.

As you are doing chores, pray in every room of your house.

As you get out of bed and start your day, utter a prayer of praise for the new day. When you sit down to eat, pray before meals. As you settle in for the night, pray before bedtime. After Dad leaves the house for work, spend a few minutes praying for him. Pray before you start your school work together or before they leave for school.

Just keep praying. Set an example for your kids by praying aloud often.

Let your kids see that prayer should be as natural as breathing. Make prayer the knee-jerk response to whatever comes your way throughout a day-both good and bad!

 

Make a Family Prayer Journal

As your family prays together, keep some form of a family prayer journal. Your kids will be able to look back and see what God has done in answer to prayers.

Practically speaking, Pinterest is filled with a thousand different ways to create a prayer journal. (Check out my Pinterest board dedicated to prayer journals for some ideas!)

Some families stick with the traditional notebook.

Others divide up their prayer requests into shoe boxes that are labeled by category. Then let them pull out a random prayer request from each box. Once a prayer is answered or resolved, place the answered prayer card into an answered prayer jar.

Another option is to purchase a card box that let’s you neatly file prayer requests into easy to see section. File your 3×5 cards and pull them out in an orderly fashion as you work your way through the box.

Pick what works for your family!

Personally, I have kept a prayer journal off and on again for almost 20 years. Every time it is amazing to see how God has been at work answering prayers. Some times He answers small prayer about the part to arrive quickly for our broken washing machine. Or big prayers about a family who just lost a dear loved one. Letting my kids witness God’s answers to prayer is vital to helping them grow confident during their own times of communication with God.

 

 

 

Write a Family Prayer Calendar To Pray Through Each Month

I will be honest. The family prayer journal one hasn’t worked consistently for us right now. I hope it will in a future season.

Now I will share what consistently works for us. That is a prayer calendar. We share this prayer calendar with our church’s prayer ministry as well so they help keep us accountable.

This prayer calendar helps us break out of the “ruts” that we tend to pray about as a family. Often we simply keep praying the same few requests each day. Soon our prayers get stale and boring. We are saying words without thinking about them.

The prayer calendar helps us change it up intentionally everyday. It helps us think of areas that we don’t normally pray about and keep us focusing on bigger issues outside of our small world. Here is an example list of what we fill in our prayer calendar with. You obviously can change it up to what works for your family but these are some ideas to get you going! 🙂

• Sunday-Pray about the church service/the speaker/those attending
• Monday-Pray about individuals in governing positions nationally, state-wide, and locally
• Tuesday-Pray for current prayer requests that we heard at church on Sunday
• Wednesday-Pray for a specific ministry in our church and those involved in the ministry
• Thursday-Pray for those working in different industries such as farming, banking, retail, etc.
• Friday-Pray for Christians in other countries and/or for missionaries we support
• Saturday-Pray prayers of repentance for sins/focus on a Scripture and ask God to help us grow more Christ-like

 

Invite Your Kid To Pray Aloud Several Times A Day

Little kids like to talk out loud all.day.long. Or maybe that is just my kids? Why not take their love to chatter and turn it to a constructive manner of conversing with God out loud in a group setting?

Personally, our family finds a few easy times to do this include when Daddy leaves for work, meal time, Morning Basket time, right before nap time and bedtime. These are natural points in our day that occur without us doing anything extra in our day but they can serve a trigger to help us to remember to lift up a prayer. Some days they are quick prayers. Other days they are longer and more intentional. It depends a lot on what is happening.

Invite your kids to pray right after you pray out loud. Encourage your kids if they ever ask to pray randomly in the day. Once they do pray aloud, thank them for sharing their prayer time with you. Let them know you love seeking the Lord together with them. 

 

Allow Your Kid Opportunity To Hear Other Christians Pray

Praying with other believers can be a huge blessing to your whole family. Find ways to spend time in corporate prayer with Christians of all ages.

When I was a teenager, the pastor in our rural church started a monthly church wide prayer time. He would randomly assign everyone to a different prayer group each month. We would gather and pray for 45 minutes.

I hated it at first because praying out loud is awkward. But I grew to love it. I heard mature Christians have conversations with God that were beautiful, Biblical, faith-filled, and free of phoniness. All the sudden, I found myself wanting to have a relationship with God so that I could talk with God like they did!

Flash forward, we started a prayer ministry at our church for the same reason. We want our kids to hear other Christians pray.

Yes, as parents we should be the primary teachers of our kids but there is a beauty to praying together with a group of believers. You really catch glimpses of what Heaven will be like in those moments.

Create opportunities for your kids to hear the prayers of mature Christians. It will be well worth the effort.

 

Service-Centered Ways To Disciple Your Child’s Heart

In the books of James, he says faith without works is dead. First John says that those who don’t obey the word, don’t truly love God.

For many Christians, we say we love God but fail to really live in obedience to God through our actions and deeds. Disciple the heart of your child to live selflessly in service of God and others.

 

Make Meals For Those In Need

If you are like my family, you like to eat meals everyday. Why not take time to make extra casseroles and special desserts for a family in need? Know a family or a single mom who just had a baby? Make a meal. Heard that someone lost their job? Make a meal for them. Have friends that lost a loved one? Make them a meal.

If possible, take the meal to them as a family. Or perhaps pick one child to help you in delivering the meal.

It can be scary and awkward to step into people’s homes during these tender moments in their life. But that is often when we most need someone there. Help ease their burden and food expenses for a day and also give them a friendly gesture.

Speaking as someone who has been on the receiving end of those meals, I can say they go a long ways to encouraging a weary family.

 

Secretly Donate Funds To A Needy Family

Giving in secret can be harder to do with kids. Especially young kids because they love to talk about what they did recently! 🙂

From time to time, my husband will hear of someone with a specific financial need. If we can, we try to secretly give them a little extra funds. Sometimes we give cash or grocery store gift cards. Other options to consider would be fuel cards to pay for gas or paid-for hotel stays if they are displaced from their home for a time.

If God has blessed you with a little extra to spare, seek ways to silently bless someone. Better yet, allow your kids ways to raise or earn a few dollars of their own to quietly give away. Being a blessing to others in secret can be a delight but it is a learned skill to be a cheerful giver!

 

Open Your Home To Host Visitors

I will be honest. This one is not very practical for my family in this season. We are crammed for space and beds. But when I was growing up, my parents rocked this one. They had a six bedroom house with just three people living in it. Therefore they opened their door regularly. We hosted missionaries, guest preachers, pastoral candidates, Christian speakers, random people that needed a night to stay, friends of family members, and basically whoever would randomly ask.

If your family has the means to do so, open your home frequently to visitors in need of a place to stay. Your kids will enjoy the conversation and exposure to many people and you will be showing them how to bless others through hospitality.

 

Set Aside Days To Serve

Perhaps there is an elderly lady in your congregation who needs her yard raked. Offer your family’s Saturday morning, or Tuesday evening to raking.

Or make grocery runs for someone who just had surgery.

Color encouraging Bible verses outside the employee entrances of a local hospital (with permission.) Then leave a basket of “thank you” snacks for the nurses and doctors on duty that day.

It is easy to skip these activities unless we plan to do them. Make a family planner or calendar and block out one day a month or an hour a week where you actively serve someone in your community.

 

Book-Centered Ways To Disciple A Child’s Heart

Reading is amazing. Whether you prefer an old-fashioned book with pages, an e-reader, or an audio book, there are plenty of ways to develop a love of reading books with your kids. As the wife to a librarian, I will also encourage you to check out lots of books from your local library. 🙂 And I can definitely say books are an awesome tool to help you disciple the heart of your child towards the Lord.

 

Read Christian Biographies Together

One time in a Bible study, a friend shared that she had watched a Discovery channel show about Muslims that had died for their faith. She voiced that she wished she knew if any Christians had ever stories like this. I might have been a little too excited to answer that question. 🙂

Maybe you know that Christians are persecuted for their faith but do your kids? Have they heard about Christians from various times in history and how they stayed faithful to Christ in the midst of trials? Christian biographies are one of our family’s favorites for chapter book read alouds.

The next time you are looking for something to read with your kids, be sure to check out Christian biographies. Reading together as a family is wonderful. Reading about Christians from history is even better!

 

 

 

Read Christian Fiction Together

Stories live in our memories for much longer than dry lectures. Perhaps your child struggles with fear. Research Christ honoring stories that show how the characters grow in their faith and trust God through their times of fear.

There is a lot of Christian fiction out there to choose from. I personally would recommend that you start with Lamplighter Theater books, G.A. Henty’s series, or solid Christian classics like The Chronicles of Narnia as good starting points. Of course there are lots more!

Be sure to listen to The Family Bookshelf podcast too. My husband and I share quick episodes where we talk about lots of books that are and aren’t worthy of a place in your family library.

 

 

 

Read Christian Non-Fiction Together

As a non-fiction book-lover, I have to include this one! There are amazing Christian books out there that you could work through together as a family. Talk your way through solid Christian apologetics titles together. Delve into theology. Read sermons from famous Christian preachers in the past like Charles Spurgeon or Jonathan Edwards. 

Disciple the heart of your child by placing a feast of Biblically and theologically sound books before them as they grow up.

Often Christians are accused of checking their brains at the door and having a blind faith. Christian non-fiction can be a perfect starting point to help your kids know that they can use logic and reason and still be a faithful, Bible-believing Christian too!

 

 

 

Music-Centered Ways To Disciple The Heart Of Your Child

Music shapes us in a completely different way. We remember lyrics to jingles we heard 30 years ago. I still sing the alphabet song when I am sorting something in alphabetical order. During the final stages of Alzheimer’s, my Grandma couldn’t remember the names of her own children but she could sing the lyrics from hymns that she knew in her childhood. Use music as a way to disciple the heart of your child on a daily basis.

 

Listen To Christian Music In The Car

Is there a solid Christian radio station in your area? Tune into that as you drive. Or if you want to skip on the radio, set up a specific playlist of Christian music that your family can listen to in the car. I tend to pick up beat worship songs, and Bible memory verse songs.

Also, check out Patch the Pirate. Music with a bit of a story to keep young kids engaged. ( I do avoid slow relaxing songs. The goal is to keep the driver awake! 🙂 )

 

Sing Hymns Together

Teach your kids quality old hymns. The rich language found in hymns is amazing. More importantly, the theological truths that are placed in this music can help your kids to sing truth through their hardest moments.

Find out the stories behind the hymns, read the words and talk about the meaning of weird phrases. Then spend a week singing and re-singing a certain hymn. Over time, you and your kids will find yourself singing these rich words back to each other during hard days and good days.

 

 

 

Worship Together With Other Christians

Pick a time to host a small gathering of Christians and sing Christian music together. Try a mixture of old and new Christian songs.

Every time I have had a chance to share in a time of focused musical worship with other Christians, I find myself sitting with tears in my eyes because I know this is the tiniest of taste of what Heavenly worship will look like before our Savior.

Allow your kids to catch those “foretastes of glory divine.”

 

Fellowship-Centered Ways To Disciple Your Child’s Heart

Christian fellowship can be so hard. It takes work getting to know and love your fellow redeemed sinners. They can hurt you. You can be frustrated by them.

Perhaps you are introverted and find that the energy required is more than you desire to give. Or as an extrovert, there might be times when you feel that you have to suppress your natural urges to talk over others in your Christian circle of friends.

Allow your kids to discover the beauty of being part of the body of believers and walk with them as they navigate the hard times. Disciple the heart of your child to know what is a healthy Christian friendship and what is not so they can set those healthy boundaries later in life for themselves.

 

Attend Church Together

Make church a priority to your family. Don’t skip it for a trip to see family unless someone is on their death bed. Tell your kids that sport games will be missed if they conflict with church. Pass on any offers to do events that will take you away from church.

Don’t do this as a matter of legalism. Do this as a priority of the heart. We hold dear what we prioritize. Our culture doesn’t value the things of God. But our family does. Therefore, we honor God’s command  to not forsake assembling with other Christians.

This could be a home church with a few other families. Or it could be an hour-long commute to a Bible preaching church in your rural area. Perhaps it will be intentionally finding a small group of believers to connect with at a larger church in your city. Whatever Bible-believing church situation you find, let your kids see you place a high emphasis on associating first and foremost with other Christians.

Remember you grow to be like those we are around the most. Show them the importance of being a good Christian friend and the importance of finding good Christian friends. Emphasize that their first friendships outside the family should always be like-minded Christians. 

 

Open Your Home To Christian Friends

Opening my home to our Christian friends is really a struggle. Something I am having to really work on. Honestly, this is the hardest thing on the entire list. I am hospitality-challenged.

And I prefer things to be “just-so” before someone comes over to visit. With four kids under 6, there is never a good “just-so” scenario in my house. 

I have found work-arounds. We meet friends at the park or the library instead. Then no one has to stress over hosting or tidying but we still get the time of fellowship.

And sometimes, my husband randomly invites someone over to throw me a total curveball. And that is good because it pushes me to not care about the externals of my house. As Christians, we should focus on a heart of hospitality and welcoming Christian friends into my home-dirty dishes, dust bunnies, and full diaper pails- included. 🙂

 

Final Thoughts

Our life as parents will do much to shape who are child become in their future. By the grace of God, we can blaze a trail of faithful Christian living that will help them glimpse the beauty of knowing Christ as their own personal Savior. When you disciple the heart of your child, the work will be worth it if we can someday spend eternity in the presence of our Savior together!

 

Your Turn

Have you considered what your kids might pick up from you naturally as they grow?

What is one way that you can intentionally seek to disciple the heart of your child today?

Can you share a method of discipleship that has worked well for your daily life as a parent?

 

Be sure to comment below and share your ideas. Praying for you as you continue to seek to fulfill God’s calling on you to disciple your kids in the admonition and love of the Lord.

 

Thanks for stopping by!

 

 

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