Raising the Standard

My husband and I, as well as our eldest daughter, just spent this past weekend at the Christian Heritage Home Educators yearly conference. What an encouragement and exhortation to keep our hearts turned toward our family and the high standard of Godly living in our homes. Not only in our home education, but in our home living and discipling as well!

Our keynote speaker was Doug Philips from Vision Forum. One can hardly walk away from 6 or so sessions with this man and not be spurred on to raise the bar a bit higher and to keep going strong in living our Christian walk with passion and vision! The other speakers and sessions were also enlightening. What I appreciate most of all, is 2 full days of smiling at others smiling at me as we pass one another. The discussions with Godly brothers and sisters in the Vendor Hall or in the hallway. Eating a meal with another couple who is daily living the standard of Biblical authority in their home. Sitting for a bit of a rest, only to strike up a conversation with one who is turning to a deeper relational atmosphere in the home. It’s the “just being with” others like-minded!

I do see the “dumbing down” effect in the current church and the myriad of defenses given for that approach. Unfortunately, in the process, many Christians ready for the meat of the word are only accepting the milk fed to them on Sunday from the pulpit as their spiritual food for the week. How grateful my husband and I are that God stirred us on to a deeper, daily walk with Him! How grateful we both are for those walking so strong and bold before us that we can look to as an example! I am so encouraged to see the same in the lives of other Christian families. These families spur me on to “not grow weary”! My husband was especially encouraged to see so many husbands/fathers searching and following this narrower path that God has been taking us on. God is so faithful, is He not, to strengthen us with one another (1 Thes. 5:11)—our brothers and sisters of the faith. How God loves the bride of Christ—the Church!

Do you have others in your life that encourage you and your husband to raise the standard in your home? Do you align your personal as well as your family’s life choices with the Bible’s standards? Are you training, disciplining, discipling and enjoying your children daily? Does your music, educational choices, books, activities, movie/television viewing, etc. all point your family to God and His sovereignty? Do you feel out of place, even in your church at times, because of the principles that your family has decided to live by?

There are so many questions we need to ask ourselves. I guess the biggest question for me, the most important one that I try to ask myself often, is where is my focus? Am I focused daily on God and what He desires or am I focused on me and what I want? Do I begin the day with God, talk about Him and turn the children’s attention toward Him throughout the day and then end the day with Him as well? So many questions to ask!!

If you haven’t sat down in awhile and taken an account of where you have been and where you are headed, may I encourage you to do so...and soon. Are you coasting through life or living each day with a passioned focus on God? Ask yourself where the standard has been set in your home. Was that place decided on by you and your personal desires? Maybe without even realizing it, you’ve simply chosen the standard you see being lived out by your friends or others in the church?

May we all seek to set the standard in our homes at the level we see laid out before us in the Word of God!