Parenting—it’s the calling many adults dream of, pray for, and desperately hope to fulfill in the way Scripture directs. And yet it’s so hard. So. Hard. Between caring for kids’ developing physical and emotional needs to trying to teach them basic life skills to cope with their new world, parents juggle changing responsibilities nonstop.
So. Many. Things.
And on top of that, it’s even more overwhelming since the journey goes so quickly and social media voices constantly warn, “Don’t blink!” How overwhelming to think we have this ever-closing window to get it right with training up our kids!
It takes the voices of elders in our lives and other parents further down the road to help us breathe and not become overwhelmed in the sea of responsibility. One such voice is Aaron Soto, a parent and pastor committed to the generational transfer of truth. In a recent conversation about discipleship, he emphasized the importance of following Jesus Christ as a family.
Like most aspects of life, it is often easier to digest spiritual advice from someone who has lived it themselves. Such is the case with Aaron Soto. As a transparent leader, he shared a season as a young parent when his kids were little and there was a bit of “adversity on the home front with kids fighting” and so on. We’ve all been there, but thanks to Pastor Soto’s vulnerability, he shared a step he took that helped in their discipleship journey as a family.
During one of their weekly devotional times, he announced to the kids a special guest was joining the devotion that night. The kids ran to the front door, which Pastor Soto opened and said, “Jesus, come on in!” As the kids watched with wide eyes, their father walked Jesus into the living room with a grand welcoming gesture.
“Kids, do you want to show Jesus your room?” he asked. They quickly agreed and so the whole family took a tour of the house to show Jesus the entire house.
When the tour ended, Pastor Soto asked his kids, “Do you think we should invite Jesus to live here?” They were quick to agree. With Jesus now as a member of the family living together in the house, the effects rippled out in various ways. Later that week when conflict arose, the Sotos stepped in as parents and asked, “So how should we handle this now that Jesus lives here with us?”
As you can imagine, the overt act of inviting Jesus into the house changed the way the family operated. It’s one thing to say we center our lives around Jesus, but sometimes that statement can get lost as too abstract for young children who don’t know how to apply that truth.
Every parent can benefit from walking through the steps of gathering the family, opening the door for Jesus, and inviting Jesus to live with them. This action, peppered with enthusiasm from parents, can help children think about what it means practically to live for Jesus at all times.
Furthermore, the practice is healthy for all ages. How beneficial might it be for a single adult living alone to physically walk through the process of inviting Jesus to live in his or her home and then throughout the week evaluating our activities as to whether or not they are conducive to making the home welcome for Jesus to live in too?
The parenting journey requires a lot of grace for both parents and kids. It also can be helpful to take the step of inviting Jesus into your home.
To hear Aaron Soto describe inviting Jesus into his home, check out this episode of The Wholyness Podcast.
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