All of our children are different. God created us uniquely. Proverbs 22:6 (Amplified) says, “Train up a child in the way he should go [and in keeping with his individual gift or bent] and when he is old, he will not depart from it.”
Your child was born with a certain type of personality, his own learning style, and specific spiritual gifts. We as parents need to learn what these are, and to take them into consideration when homeschooling our children. We can’t have an all-for-one, one-for-all, cookie-cutter education for our children. God doesn’t treat us adults that way in teaching us and helping us to grow up. As Charlotte Mason says, children are born persons. Every child is a unique, highly intelligent, wonderful individual, a marvelous masterpiece created by God.
At my main website www.bethjones.net, I just wrote a blog and an article on the spiritual gifts. You can observe the spiritual gifts even in young children, because these precious gifts come from God, not from the child’s environment or parents (although environment and parents can certainly influence the development and maturing of these gifts).
Here is the blog and the article pdf download that I included at my other site. I encourage you to discover your spiritual gifts, and those of your child’s (children’s). This knowledge will enable you to understand your child better, and to be a better teacher for his or her education – and most of all, to be your child’s encourager to use his or her gifts for God’s glory and to fulfill God’s calling and purpose for his or her life.
**************
Imagine that you and your husband are having your 25th anniversary. You can hardly believe that you and your husband have been married this long, and that you have made it. You’ve seen some good times, some bad times, and times when you thought you weren’t going to make it!
You want to be sure to buy something really special to let your husband know how much you love, respect, and appreciate him, and are thankful that he has been faithful to you all these years. You have been secretly saving money for the last two years to buy him that nice Cartier men’s Must 21 Chronoscaph Stainless Steel and Black Rubber Chronograph watch for $3,130.00!
On the night of your anniversary, you and your husband go out to dinner at one of the nicest restaurants in Kansas City, and order the five-course, prime rib dinner. There are candles and soft music. He gives you a box and inside is a gift that brings you to tears – two plane tickets to Africa, the desire of your heart!
You laugh and cry with joy, and then wait in expectation as you give him his present. You can hardly wait to see the expression on his face when he opens it. He just won’t even believe you got this for him! He smiles happily, comments on the beautiful way you wrapped it with the gold, curled ribbon (you curled it yourself with the scissors!), and sets it beside his plate at the table. You look over at him with a puzzled expression, and he says, “I know you gave the best gift possible. One day I’m really going to enjoy it. Maybe on our anniversary in 10 years.”
This story sounds a little ridiculous, doesn’t it? Yet so often that’s what God’s people do with the spiritual gifts that He has given them. They sit on the shelf, unused and going to waste. I believe there is so much more potential lying inside every one of us – that we have only seen the tip of the iceberg in what God desires for us to do and to be!
The best is yet to come! To learn more about your spiritual gifts and potential in Christ, click on this link, The Spiritual Gifts:
Beth Jones