Developing Character In This Life, Part 2
“Love Wins” now has a Study Guide
What Influences the Shaping of Character?
Good question and to answer it, following is a list of eight things that influence a person’s character but understand this. These things only influence character, they aren’t the final word on who you are or what you become. They combine to form the melting pot in which bad qualities are brought to the surface and hopefully replaced by the good. You are defined by your responses not fate.
I raise this issue because Rob Bell in Love Wins
Therefore, focusing more intently on developing character now – in this life – may be more important than convention suggests. A look at each influence can give us insight on what to expect and how to respond. The first item to consider is:
Divine Decree
Divine Decree, aka, God’s Will.
I hesitate to use the word “Decree” because it is associated with a predetermined, unbending, never changing plan formulated for and imposed on every individual but God’s will, though unchanging, does flex. God does have a plan for each person’s life but it is not detailed to the nth degree and isn’t comprised of every thing that happens to you.
God knows every time you stub your toe – actually before you stub it – but He doesn’t plan these things. They happen, we react, He uses them.
God’s will is firm but not imposed. It is perfect but our ability to follow it is not. His will is constant while we waiver back and forth as the following illustration shows. God’s will must be ratified by human choice. Each person chooses to leave it or pursue it but God doesn’t force it down your throat or manipulate you into following it. When we make plan-warping mistakes God is smart enough and powerful enough to work around it.
Although specific in many ways, God’s will is also general. That is, it applies to everyone in the same way. For example, every person is to love his or her neighbor equally and must cherish THEIR married partner only.
The important point to remember is: Read more
Love Wins – Developing Character In This Life
“Love Wins” now has a Study Guide
How Far One Descends
Doesn’t Matter
If Character Is The Cream
That Rises To The Top
In my last post I focused on character development in the next life, after death and my ideas were motivated by Rob Bell’s book, Love Wins
Conventional wisdom says death is the point at which all winning and losing is final. It’s a finish line not a transition, meaning, of course…
The saved will be transformed into a fully complete and finished state of absolute, never changing, never ending bliss.
And the unrepentant are fixed forever in a state of never ending corruption and condemnation. There is no turning back, looking up, moving forward or thinking again. It is over, finished and done, for everyone.
Love Wins
But post-death issues isn’t the subject of this article. Character development is.
Rob also emphasized the importance of building character in this life, so much so that some accuse him of teaching “salvation by works.”
Don’t believe it. The same people who twist Rob’s ideas about character, emphasize the development of character in their teachings also. The hypocrisy is, other than compiling long lists of things-not-allowed and projecting loads of shame on those who falter, they do very little to make a difference.
And, if death isn’t final and character will continue to develop in the next life then a good question to ask is, “Where will the after-life development begin?” The answer is obvious. It will start in the next life where you left off in this one. If you are 85% at death you’ll start there. If you’re only 25% you’ll start there, so the more you do now the less you will need to do later.
Rob’s ideas seem strange because popular teachings actually work against character development. Eternal security is a good example. Conservative theology teaches that salvation can’t be lost. Any character shortage at death won’t effect your eternal destiny. Your salvation is secure – eternal security. And, as I’ve already mentioned, these same schools of thought imply we will be upgraded to 100% perfection at the moment of death. If that is really true, why bother doing the hard work now?
If the good qualities I don’t develop in this life will be immediately added at death what real motivation is there to do anything other than hold on and wait? Read more
Nurture Your Child’s Emotional Resilience
The following sentiment has become the mantra for all good parenting and every interested parent has made this statement, or something like it, in the process of raising their kids:
I want my children to have a better life than I had.
And one of the ways parents help their children attain a better life is to help them avoid all the mistakes they made themselves. They assume that “mistake free” is equivalent to better. On the surface it sounds smart. Inwardly it feels good.
The reality, however, is that children managed by this rule are not better off. Instead of being better at life they are emotionally inhibited, stunted, crippled or lacking sensibility. Which means guarding them against disheartening moments might do more harm than good. Like many responses to charitable needs, the protective approach to parenting is a short term, knee jerk response which creates long term damage.
We feel better after force-guiding our children around every tripping point but does this make them better at managing life or just more managed? Over-navigating a child’s life might save them from some immediate “toe stubbing” but can it encourage them to develop the watchfulness and maneuverability to avoid future crashes or manage them well if they can’t?
The truth is, the one thing children will not always have is a watchful parent warning them and steering them away from every life sapping experience. And the one lesson every child needs to learn is how to accept and manage their mistakes well.
Parents earned their wisdom through hard knocks. It made them stronger and smarter and they shouldn’t rob their children of the same opportunity. Second hand wisdom isn’t easy to swallow and every wise person knows that… Read more
Young Children And TV Don’t Mix – John Rosemond
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Chapter Review – Television, Computers and Video Games
John definitely saves the best for last in The New Six-Point Plan for Raising Happy, Healthy Children
This final chapter is mostly about TV and John forthrightly says what most people already know but are afraid to admit.
…Watching television inhibits the development of initiative, curiosity, resourcefulness, creativity, motivation, imagination, reasoning and problem-solving abilities, communication skills, social skills, fine and gross motor skills, and eye-hand coordination.
And after saying this he implies other detriments could be named also.
Not a nice picture. No pun intended.
Even though John’s advice does not run parallel with the opinions of his peers he doesn’t shy away from saying what parents need to hear. No hinting or beating around the bush. He knows and readily admits that his advice runs counter to modern ideas about raising kids but while everyone stammers he speaks out.
In spite of his academic achievements, however, what he advises, he learned and proved in the laboratory of family life as a child, a parent and a counselor.
So his advice is qualified by many levels of experience and academic studies.
In this last chapter John focuses on the problems TV causes, particularly in the life of developing preschoolers, and he draws from his own experience to make his point.
His son, Eric, was failing the third grade and as it turned out television was a major contributor to the problem.
Eric was struggling to complete in-class assignments and John and his wife, Willie, were exhausted with pushing and prodding him to finish the tasks at home. The stalemate was broken when Eric’s teacher informed them – only half way through the year – that Eric would not be promoted to fourth grade.
Up to that point John had faithfully applied the popular principles of psychology for raising children. Following that meeting, however, things changed.
John’s wife, Willie, had a heart to heart with John about changing their parenting ways. They both agreed that they hadn’t turned out badly so maybe their parents weren’t that wrong after all. Together, they devised a new approach which John describes as:
A benevolent dictatorship, the antithesis of the parenting that was popular at the time. We began telling Eric and Amy what we wanted them to do instead of asking, pleading, bargaining, bribing, reasoning, and explaining – i.e., wishing. We embraced a zero-tolerance policy concerning disobedience. If one of them disobeyed, we punished instead of talked.
And probably the most dramatic change they made was the suspension of TV viewing. They didn’t just stop watching TV, they gave theirs away.
The end result was nothing short of remarkable. In John’s words: Read more
“Toys And Play” by John Rosemond
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Chapter Review – “Toys And Play”
Parents have been duped into thinking that giving their children “things,” otherwise known as toys, along with little or no responsibility is the right parenting approach to take.
But in The New Six-Point Plan for Raising Happy, Healthy Children
John tells the story of a set of parents who, after secretly watching their child play with a large marking pen, morphing it into a rocket ship, an alien and a ray gun in just a matter of minutes, decided to buy him a replica of a space shuttle for Christmas.
In their minds that was the perfect toy.
However, three weeks after getting this marvelous toy he was bored.
It had every bell and whistle. All the design features were visible. But it was an untouchable.
The joy of playing with it was diminished by the fear of breaking it. This toy like many others is more ornamental than practical. No functionality.
It had a very limited use and could stimulate only a very short interest span.
The only way an exact replica of a space shuttle can be anything other than an exact replica of a space shuttle is to break it. Actually, that could be said about any exact replica of anything.
And most kids are afraid to break these toys, not because they love them so much but because the parents do. These toys usually cost a bundle so any breakage draws immediate disapproval. Besides, like museum pieces, these toys are hard to embrace anyway.
For these reasons John suggests that childhood as it was intended to be has come perilously close to an end. Read more
Tim Pepper - Beautiful Frustration