Daly Focus Blog
How far into the future do you believe good parenting influences children? A week? A year? What if I told you that the choices you make today will affect your family for generations to come?
I see a visual reminder of how influence works every time my family goes camping. Our boys are grown now, but they become like little kids again every time we pull up to a lake. The first thing they do is hop out of the truck, grab a handful of rocks, and see how far they can skip each one.
If you’re playing a game, it’s important to have a scorekeeper. It’s the only way to judge someone’s performance and determine a winner.
But in marriage, scorekeepers are destructive. When a relationship is defined by “winners” and “losers,” it’s only a matter of time before things fall apart.
Scorekeepers are easy to spot in a conflict. Their goal is to win. They don’t compromise, respect their spouse’s point of view, or resolve issues in a way that benefits the relationship.
Making good decisions about your future requires wisdom, discernment – sometimes even divine intervention.
I’ll never forget a moment like that in my own life. I was the quarterback of my high school football team and at a crossroads. Scholarships were on the table, and I had dreams of making it to the pros.
But I was also serious about my faith and wanted it to influence my direction in life. So, right before one of my games, I prayed this prayer: “Lord, if you don’t want me to pursue college football, break a bone today … just don’t let it hurt.”
Jump ahead to the third quarter.
There’s a storm coming. Are you ready?
When author Gary Thomas moved to Houston, he initially felt like locals over-reacted to storm warnings. Weather reports would become ominous and people seemed overly anxious about plywood, waterproofing supplies, and extra groceries. All that fuss for nothing because the storms usually proved insignificant.
Then came Hurricane Harvey in 2017, which dumped over 50 inches of rain in three days, causing catastrophic flooding, $100 billion worth of damage, and the deaths of over 100 people.
The best parenting combines authority with love. It gives children boundaries while helping them to feel cared for and nurtured. Sadly, some parents lean heavy on authority and less on love. That approach reduces parenting to a list of demanding rules that is damaging to a child.
My step-dad, Hank, was all authority. His parenting was as simple as “because-I-say-so.” Break one of his rules, and you’d regret it. It was his way of keeping order, but it didn’t sit well with my older sister, Kim.
The abortion industry promotes medical abortions as “safer” and “easier” than surgical abortions because there’s no need for a surgeon, medical staff, or specialized equipment. The actual appeal, however, is that medical options make abortions more common and cheaper, thus creating a higher profit-margin.
It’s estimated that 42% of early abortions (up to eight weeks) and 30% of all abortions are the result of the medication Mifepristone. Also known as RU486, this medication convinces a woman’s body that she’s not pregnant, breaking down the connections between mother and embryo.
Each day seems to bring with it new disturbing videos and reports of individuals and groups behaving badly – from ransacking a supermarket, to brazenly shoplifting from a drugstore, to sucker punching an innocent person on a subway station platform.
Violence is just one symptom of a sick society. Other signs include a disregard or downright hostility toward all things sacred, because of our selfishness, seeing children as burdens rather than blessings, the normalization of aberrant sexual behavior and a general disregard for civility and good manners.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) believes abortion liberates otherwise enslaved women.
Here’s what she said earlier today:
“Forcing poor and working-class people to give birth against their will, against their consent, against their ability to provide for themselves or a child, is a profound economic issue and it’s certainly a way to keep a workforce basically conscripted to large-scale employers and to employers to work more against their will, to take second and third jobs against their desire and their own autonomy.”
Reducing the beauty and joy of children to mere economics is distasteful in and of itself, but such rationale defies common sense logic and reasoning.
Ladies, did you enter into marriage expecting more connection, conversation, and intimacy with your husband than you’re getting? If the romance in your marriage has faded, you may even be wondering, “Did I marry the wrong man?”
My friend and colleague Dr. Juli Slattery tells the women she counsels that the secret to intimacy in marriage is not finding a hero to be your husband … but uncovering the hero that’s already there.
To call forth the hero in your husband, tap into what Dr.
Is making others happy making you miserable?
Maybe you feel guilty when you say no to a friend, a family member, or your spouse. Maybe you’ve earned a reputation as someone who gets things done, so people keep asking you for help. And you agree to help. Even though your schedule is already full.
Author and speaker Karen Ehman knows just how you feel. She has struggled with people pleasing for years. One time, an old friend called to ask if her college-aged son could stay with her family a couple nights a week during his summer internship.
Jim Daly is a husband, father and President of Focus on the Family and host of its National Radio Hall of Fame broadcast. His blog, Daly Focus, is full of timely commentary and wisdom designed to help you navigate and understand today’s culture. His latest book is Marriage Done Right.
