Parenting

After the kids are grown and gone, you are more than halfway through this thing that we call life. How are you doing? How would you grade your life to this point? What are your strengths and weaknesses? What have you done right?  What have you done wrong? What were your missed opportunities?

Why go through that potentially painful exercise in self-examination?

So that you can see clearly the rest of the way.  If you can learn from the past for a better future.

You have invested in many of the right things; marriage, kids, a career, a church, a ministry. You have paid the bills and made your way through life with some acceptable degree of success.

You have made some mistakes too. You see it now. Age has brought you a measure of wisdom, but you cannot change the past. But you are wiser for the mistakes that you have made.  I used to tell my kids, that if they would simply learn from their mistakes, they would all be geniuses by now!  How much more is that true of empty nesters?

So, What is next for you in marriage and in life? What is marriage like after the empty nest?

Some marriages are so focussed on the kids; things like keeping them alive, reducing the damage that they can do as teenagers, and protecting them as best you can from the big mistakes in life.  You have guided them into adulthood. It consumed much of your family time, all of your vacations, and 110% of your money. What now?

Now that you have the time, the money, and the freedom what will you do with it?  How will your invest your time?  What should marriage be like after the empty nest? It should be fantastic!! I can prove it in one word.  Grandkids!! All of the fun of kids, without diapers, discipline, and sleepless nights.

But seriously, what will you invest in now that you have the time and the opportunity? How do we finish well?  How do we best live after the empty nest? How can we have our latter days blessed?

What is your vision for life? What is your goal? We have one but many of us do not know what it is. What we actually do in life reveals what our vision for life is. What do we think that life is all about? Well, how do we actually live life? What do we spend our time on? So, what is your practical vision for life?  What do you actually do?

I have sometimes said that you can discern someone’s vision for life by looking at the way they spend their money. That is what they value. But, the one thing in life that is more valuable than money is time. Your vision for life is revealed and proclaimed by what you spend your time on.

Let me give some practical advice for investing your time after the empty nest.

Pursue your spouse. All people are made in the image of God; that means that they are all potentially, infinitely fascinating. Including your spouse!! Deepen your marriage. You now have an unrestricted opportunity to discover your spouse.  Make it a priority. Talk, fellowship, and share with each other.  Serve them in love, and that love will return to you 10 fold.  Take up a hobby together. Do life together.

Pursue your God. If the image of God in your spouse is fascinating, and it is; what will knowing the God behind the image be like?  Go deeper into your knowledge of God, your experience of God, and your enjoyment of God. You have more time to pursue God, pursue Him. Spend time with God, the ancient of days. Benefit from his wisdom.

Daily apply the gospel to yourself. Remind yourself daily who you are in Christ.

Invest in your kids and grandkids. Your children still need you. Your support and encouragement can be a tremendous blessing to their families and their marriage. Invest in your kids, still. Pour yourself, your love, and wisdom into your grandchildren.

Set your house in order. Write a will; answer the end-of-life questions; put it in writing. Plan your funeral. Get rid of the junk you have accumulated as you traveled through life. Don’t make your kids do it.

Invest in a church, a church fellowship, and a ministry. You have time, experience, and gifts. Use them. Be yourself in the presence of God and his people. Receive the love of God freely offered to you in the gospel. Hang around those people whose lives have been changed, sweetened, and redeemed by the grace of God. There is nothing better in life and no greater preparation for heaven.

Every stage of life has its joys and opportunities.  The empty nest can be, and perhaps should be, the best time of your life.

Parenting by Grace

It’s done every day in Christian homes around the world. W

ell-meaning parents, zealous to see their children doing what is right, ask the law to do in the lives of their children what only grace can accomplish. They think that if they have the right set of rules, the right threat of punishment, and consistent enforcement, their children will be okay. In ways these parents fail to understand, they have reduced parenting to being a law-giver, a prosecutor, a jury, and a jailer… In their zeal to control behavior, they look to the tools of threat, manipulation, and guilt.

 

This way of thinking denies two significant

things that the Bible tells
us. The first is that before sin is a matter of behavior, it is always a matter of the heart. We sin because we are sinners… The second is that if threats, manipulation, and guilt could create lasting change in the life of another person, Jesus would not have had to come. (They) really do ask the law to do what only god in amazing grace is able to accomplish. 

Thankfully, God hasn’t left us to our own power to change. He meets us with transforming grace and calls us to be tools of that grace in his redemptive hands. He lifts the burden of change off our shoulders and never calls us to do what only he can do. So we expose our children to God’s law and faithfully exercise authority while we seek to be tools of heart change in the hands of a God whose grace is greater than all of the sin we’re grappling with.

Paul David Tripp