Clinging to earthly pleasures

"Remember what I say: if you would cleave to earthly pleasures, these are the things which murder souls. There is no surer way to get a seared conscience and a hard impenitent heart, than to give way to the desires of the flesh and mind. It seems nothing at first, but it tells in the long run.

"Consider what Peter says: 'abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul' (1 Peter 2:11). They destroy the soul's peace, break down its strength, lead it in to hard captivity, make it a slave."

~ J. C. Ryle (1816-1900)

When I read this, I thought about my computer usage. Not "bad stuff" but just a lot of time wasters...  a lot... and it can feel addictive at times.  Earthly pleasures... these are the things which murder souls...

Why are boys so destructive??

WHY?  Why do boys destroy things with no thought to the outcome?  See exhibit A, below.

Why would you destroy something when you had fun playing with it??  I do not understand why a boy of seven years would do this.  Apparently he has some sort of scissorlust, as I found a pile of snipped-up rubber bands on the floor yesterday.  (We've had other trouble in the past with scissor misuse, but I won't go into that.)  I should have hidden the scissors at that point, but I could not find them...

Oh Lord, give me grace!

Throw away the "input/output" theory of parenting!

"And 'train up a child in the way he shall go'—we've taken that verse to an extreme, to almost make it a guarantee. And I was always taught with Proverbs, you read them as tendencies. At Dallas Seminary, this was drilled into us—you take those as tendencies. We've taken that verse, along with a lot of the social pressures, and we've fallen for this faulty 'input/output' theory of parenting that says, whatever I put into my kid is what I'm going to get out of my kid. And that is just not true."

"As a pastor, I am constantly trying to challenge our parents with the verse, 'His mercies are new every day.'  So we have to let ourselves go a little bit—because here's what I've found with Christian parents especially: we take too way too much credit and way too much blame for the way our children turn out."

~Ted Cunningham on Focus on the Family interview, "Moving Beyond Performance-Based Parenting"

Me and my silly boys