The Caffeinated Christian

We are discussing the topics that you should be talking to your kids about instead of someone else.  In these first few posts I am dealing with some foundational issues that I think are critical to these otherwise difficult conversations.  With this post I want to discuss why parents don’t talk to their kids. According to Deuteronomy 6:4-9 the home is the primary vehicle of modeling and teaching Biblical values to our children.  Sadly the home is becoming little more than a shelter for a couple of adults with a couple of kids.  A lot of people talk about their marriage is like two ships passing in the night.  If this is true of marriages, when it comes to parenting the house has become a harbor at shift change.  Why don’t parents talk to their children? Parents have farmed out their time to coaches.   While the days have not gotten longer, the demands on our time have certainly increased.  It is hard to tell whether this is out of necessity or choice, but we have no doubt beco

As a Christian parent we skate on a razor’s edge between protecting and sheltering our children from certain topics or talking to them about these things before someone else does.  Our children’s bodies, minds, values, and futures seem to be laid bare on an altar of cultural vulnerability everyday.  When is it too early to talk to them about sex, substances, and other societal ills?  We don’t want to be early, but we sure don’t want to be late. In a media saturated culture the issue is not beating someone else to the punch.  Truth is, we don’t have to wonder if someone else is talking to our children, someone already is.  Unless you and your family live in a buried bus in the Mojave desert your sheltering techniques are probably sub par.  If you do live in a buried bus in the Mojave desert, I’m sure there is a reality show that would love to talk to you.  You are must see TV. One would think that Disney Channel is kid island in a sea of un-family friendly TV.  Yet Walt’s vision

Today I want to teach on a word that seems to be sorely lacking in the Christian walk. Discernment.  When it comes to making decisions we basically use two facets of our God given faculties; the thinking part and the feeling part. Generally we refer to these as the head and the heart.   A person who is all head and no heart makes intelligent choices, but they are about as personally intriguing as a slug. Head without heart decisions come across cold, perhaps even selfish. They generally lack empathy.  Head statements are extremely factual, but they come across as bazookas to the souls of people who actually have a heart. The alternative extreme is heart with no head.  Here I give you a range of characters from the daredevil to the hopeless romantic.  I know it is hard to think of Romeo and Evel Kenievel as being closely related, but on either side of the scale, heart people usually end up with lots of broken things or perhaps even emotionally dead.  Heart decisions are n

In times like these it is especially difficult to take seriously a passage like 1 Timothy 2:1-4.  First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. (1 Timothy 2:1-4 ESV) Since Barack Obama assumed office in 2009 it has been hard to personally stomach the illogical ideological and moral collapse of the United States of America.  Never has there been a more blatant disregard for the constitution, religious freedom, free speech, and inalienable rights.  Politically, this has been the most frustrating period of my life as we watch our nation no longer promote work and education but instead reward the lazy and encourage ignorance.   Yet, in all of this, I hav