Raising Kids for Holy Worldliness

What does it mean to raise our children well? Many of us assume that the best approach is to shield and protect our kids from a culture that has more than its fair share of negative and dangerous influences. We strive to keep them separated from the world. But is that what we should be doing? Jeram Barrs, a professor of Christian Studies at Covenant Seminary reminds us that if we are faithful to God and His word, that’s actually an approach to avoid. He writes, “Our children need to learn that Christ calls us to live in the world and to serve him in the world. We are to work at preparing them to understand the ideas of our time which are in opposition to the knowledge of God. We should be practicing hospitality to unbelievers, the needy, and sinner so that all through their lives our children have involvement in broken people’s lives modeled for them. We need to be like Jesus, friends of sinners, and we should be encouraging our children to be the same all through their lives.”