Daly Focus Blog
We sat around the living room, trying to be productive while facing death. The date was Wednesday, October 28, 2020, and tomorrow would be my Mother’s long-awaited funeral. Her cousin, Andy Cook, a highly respected minister, was asking me and my family rapid fire questions about her life as he prepared to deliver the eulogy.
The conversation was like reopening an old wound. Mom had died six months earlier on April 19th, after a battle with cancer.
Author Lee Strobel believes that family is the answer for today’s children to become “the greatest generation that has ever lived for Jesus Christ.”
He has strong evidence to back up that claim. Researchers at the University of California at Santa Barbara conducted a landmark multigenerational study concluding that parents are fundamental in passing down religious beliefs to their children.
In addition, the study affirmed that having a close bond with one’s father is the single biggest influence in a child’s life.
Kyle Poulson was eight years old when he was told that he was adopted – a moment that became an anchor in his life. He felt blessed to grow up in a loving family with faithful Christian parents who wanted him.
Kyle’s adoptive father died in 1995. Before his adoptive mother passed away in 2016, she encouraged Kyle to find his birth mother, a process he began in February of 2017. Because the records were closed, he ran into dead end after dead end and thought he might never find his birth mother.
Strong-willed women, on the other hand, are often characterized as “bossy” or “controlling.”
Author Cynthia Tobias says that strong-willed women are trail blazers. Strong-willed women:
God doesn’t want to rid women of their personalities. He wants to direct their strong wills and use them for His purposes. When women submit themselves to the Lord, He can channel their strength into transforming their marriages, influencing their children in the right direction, and seeing God’s kingdom advanced in whatever other ways the Lord chooses to use them.
What kind of tools are in your parenting toolbox?
In a regular toolbox, like the one in your garage, you’ll find hammers, screwdrivers, and different sized wrenches – tools with very particular uses for specific problems around the house. There’s an old saying: if the only tool you have is a hammer, everything will look like a nail after a while.
There isn’t one tool to rule them all.
It’s the same with parenting. Some moms and dads only have one tool in their parenting toolbox that they use in every situation – like anger, overly strict rules, or permissiveness.
One of your most important responsibilities as a parent is to pass your faith and values on to your children. It may also be one of your most challenging tasks. A shocking turn of events at the 2008 Summer Olympics illustrates why.
Both the U.S. men’s and women’s 4 x 100 relay teams were expected to compete for the gold medal. Instead, neither team made it to the finals. Their exit from competition wasn’t because another country outran them.
Bill Butterworth had something of an awakening when his father died.
At the funeral, Bill stood behind the lectern and spoke as the family representative. As important as what he shared about his father is what he didn’t share about his father.
Bill didn’t mention his father’s career or his real estate holdings. He didn’t talk about his father’s bank account or his stock portfolio. Instead, he shared about what his father believed and valued, and recounted some of the meaningful life lessons his father had taught him.
On Good Friday, April 9, 2004, tragedy struck the Bainter family. Brett was mowing the lawn on his riding mower, while his three-year-old son, Jake, played in the driveway.
At one point, Brett backed up, not realizing that Jake had run up behind him. A baby-sitter who was supervising Jake tried to stop the impending accident, but it was too late. Brett ran over Jake, and the young boy would end up losing his right leg.
Dementia is one of the most difficult issues that families face today because the diagnosis is often a surprise, even though the statistics surrounding it are staggering.
Dementia is the general term for deterioration in memory and thinking, behavioral processing, and the ability to perform everyday tasks for yourself.
Sarah Smith, our guest on our Focus on the Family Broadcast “Finding God’s Beauty in Alzheimer’s and Dementia,” was shocked when her fiercely independent mother – nicknamed Beauty – was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s.
If you made a list of all the bad things that you never thought would happen, what would you write down?
For some, picking up the broken pieces of your life and starting over again with a blended family might be at the top of that list.
This new chapter may have come about through death or divorce or some other circumstance, but the challenge is the same: how to overcome the difficulties common to blended families and give this new part of your life its best chance to thrive.
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.
