The Most Important Legacy...

What is the most important Legacy you want to leave your children?

Have you thought about it?  I have been thinking about this a lot.  It is very obvious for me to "label" the legacy

...Faith...

but the next question I asked myself is where I have been re-evaluating...

How do I spend my time with my children?  

Since I home educate, I have all day everyday with my sweet blessings; but how much of my time is spent delighting in the Lord?  Soaking up His Word?  Do my Kids interrupt my Alone time with God?  Do they see my time as a cherished time mommy is having with God? What stumbling blocks are in my way or do I think are in my way of preventing me to meet God everyday... during the day... while my kids are with me?  

If I beleive the most important legacy I could leave my children is faith and relationship with Jesus Christ... how often am I modeling my faith and relationship for them to see?  How often am I leading them into a deeper relationship with Christ, beyond doing the Bible Curiculum, or doing devotions at dinner because its our family routine.  I'm not saying those things are bad... we need to be intentional about learning the word of God and teaching our Children God is in EVERYTHING... every subject in school.  I have just been thinking about how I model my walk with God on a daily basis.  I Love to serve out of obedience... I work hard every day and I diligently teach my children to work hard serving one another as well... however does the Martha in me consume my day... or do I make being a "Mary" and going to the feet of the Cross when I start getting tired a visible daily occurence.  I model for my girls,  being "busy in the home" because it is what we are called and blessed to do, but as a mom who loves Jesus, we also need and should yearn for time reading the Word of God, his letter to us, and model that desire.  

Well the hard truth is simple... 

If we aren't modeling that yearning for Christ and making time for Him, even randomly daily, little spits of time here and there... keeping our Bibles open on the counter... and every second we have a chance glances at this love letter that gives so much wisdom.  

If we aren't doing it...

Well maybe its because that yearning isn't really alive in our hearts to begin with?

We can't fake it with kids.

They see it all, the good, the bad, & the ugly.

Do they see you yearning for Jesus every chance you get as if it were your power source or your living water?

Are We What We Eat?

We've all heard the old adage, "You Are What You Eat."

While that statement isn't literally true, there is much truth to the fact that what we eat effects how we feel, it effects our health, and it effects our self image indirectly & for some of us directly.

I want to address 2 things in this post.

1) What we are feeding our families is leaving a legacy or creating habits in our children.

2)We have to be wary of allowing an extreme view of food to become an idol in our homes.

Habits are formed in our children, even without trying.  What ever we do on a regular basis has potential for becoming a "habit" or legacy.  For example, we juice and or make a smoothie with herbs, every day.  Yep, everyday! When I first started this journey of juicing, it was hard to get over the work involved, cutting the veggies and fruit, cleaning the machine, and then there was the grocery bill (out the roof with organic yummies).  But as we stuck with it, it just became part of our way of life, part of our schedule.  It became a habit.  Will my children do it when they grow up?  Probably some of them, its hard to see now.  

For some, eating fast food on a daily basis can be the habit.  Others, might only make everything from scratch.  Which ever applies to you, we all need to be aware that we are teaching our children by our example, what is acceptable and what attitudes towards food are acceptable.  

We all need to be careful not to allow our dietary philosophies and conviction to become an idol.  God warns us, in his good book against having idols and against disputing over things such as food, because it is not an eternal issue.  Our diet should never prevent us from fellowship with others.  When we teach our children we can only eat a certain way, and cater to that diet, they never learn how to be gracious and polite about "trying" and eating someone else's food... its a simple way to teach your child about having respect.  

For example, we have a few kiddos with food intolerances, some more severe than others.  There was a time when we needed to detox, so I was pretty strict about their diets, but within that time I also found how difficult it was to have fellowship (over meals) with people.  Our commitment is to God, and to living healthy to treat our bodies as holy temples, so we can serve Him more actively.  

"Be not among drunkards or among gluttonous eater of meat..." Prov 23:20Here God likens gluttony to drunkenness... pretty serious.

"The one who keeps the law is a son with understanding, but a companion of gluttons shames his father."  Prov. 28:7

"They have made me jealous with what is no god; they have provoked me to anger with their idols.So I will make them jealous with those who are no people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation." Deuteronomy 32:21

"Now concerning food offered to idols: we know that "all of us possess knowledge." This "knowledge" puffs up, but love builds up. " 1 Cor. 8:1

As parents the habits we are teaching our children in regards to food can create idols, even for them, so we need to be on guard.  We don't want to leave a legacy of idols, do we.  On the other hand, how we feed our children also creates healthy eating habits or well no awareness.  When we don't teach awareness, and we may not even be eating unhealthy, really... that as well can lead to unhealthy habits. 

The point is this, what are we teaching our children... is there a balance of healthy awareness and conviction not to be a glutton... but a careful sensitivity to not allowing judgementalism or idols to be bred in our childrens' hearts as well.

What we eat and Teach is accpetable to Eat Leaves a Legacy!

Leaving A Legacy of Health

This could potentially be a controversial post.  Many people's ideas of what is "healthy" vary so drastically, so bare with me.  The basic concept is this...  What habits we currently model for our children on a day to day basis in the areas of exercise, food and dietary choices, medicinal preferences, and even mental health (staying stimulated and not going stagnate) are imprinting in them habits and what they envision themselves doing when the grow up.  

Today I am going to tackle the topic of exercise, if you never exercise... then your children are most likely not going to envision themselves exercising as an adult...  this kind of legacy can be dangerous to their health as it is dangerous to ours.  Believe me this is a super convicting post- I am a work in progress- but especially in this area of my life.  Unfortunately, it took me "sacrificing" my health in the name of caring for my family (really, making an idol out of my family in a way), thinking they were more important than taking care of myself... and in my mind of course my children are, but if I don't take care of myself, how can I take care of them.  This became a huge reality for me these past 2 pregnancies when I found myself on bed-rest.  I'm not saying that my being on bed-rest was all my fault, because I didn't exercise, but I will say that I might not be struggling as much as I do with all the symptoms I have if I would have made exercise a priority vs an option. 

I think there is a problem among mother's today... "A Motherhood Martyr Myth!"
Or maybe its just me, in which case this post is more of a confession. 
I used to think that I was a bad mom if I ever left my children, even to go to the doctor or to exercise.
I was constantly struggling in my mind because I already felt like I didn't have enough hours in the day to get everything I needed to get done with my kids and home, let alone, taking off to exercise.  Then there is justifying paying someone to help take care of the precious ones while I exercise. 
It seemed like such a "waste" of money, which furthered my guilt.
 I am currently still in healing from this very oppressive thinking that you are the only one that should ever and only be with your children. 
I personally am a healthier mommy, when I am able to get a serious focused exercise break in a couple times every week. 

So what we have found works for our family is this...

2 days a week: I go to a gym that has a pool to do water therapy &/or strengthening exercises (weights)
I usually take Kelsey my oldest with me at least 1 day/week for her to learn how to use a gym and so we can have fun doing it together.  This has also been a real productive time for my spirit to be filled... with technology devices today, I have been fortunate enough to take advantage of listening to sermons and talks as well as worship... which feeds my soul and helps me be a better mom during the rest of the week.
Then 2-3 days per week the kids and I have an exercise program we go through in our little at home gym... I rotate kids on bike/tread climber/ tumbling mat with our musical instruments and Taebo for kids video.  It is fun!  Definitely productive and helps get the wiggles out of my boys. 
As for the other days of the week... the kids do swimming lessons 2 days per week and we have a small farm with lots of physical work!  :)

Every family's convictions on this topic are so different, so please don't think you need to do it all like us.  This is just what works for our family after much trial and error!


What does your family's physical life look like?

Leaving A Legacy of Work Ethic

One of the Legacies I find myself very passionate about is Work Ethic.  Something desperately wrong has happened to the youth of today.  It's called low expectations on the parts of parents and the fulfillment of those low expectations by their children.  Isaac and I went to a seminar years ago called the Household of Strength by Gregg Harris, where he talked about this concept in great depth.  As Isaac and I sat there listening we were getting fired up, because we had so many conversations about this exact issue.  We had decided years ago that we want to Leave a Legacy of strong work ethic which ultimately comes from having a vision for what you are accomplishing and an innate drive to compel you to take action and get it done.
I personally believe that work ethic is not something that is taught, it is caught... just like the love for reading, compassion, and so much more.

In order to teach work ethic, well you need to have some yourself, right???

Proverbs 21:25-26 says this:

"The desire of a lazy man kills him.  For his hands refuse to labor.  He covets greedily all day long, But the righteous gives and does not spare."

So what are some practical ways we like to practically teach work ethic?  

Well we don't give allowance.  Personal preference here, but we feel that the kids are part of a family unit, a team.  If we all make a mess, then we all work diligently to get the mess picked up and then we can all enjoy the next activity together.  We have taught our children that in life God gives us the gifts of "jurisdictions" in our life and as we show him (and our parents) we are "responsible" with little, we are then given greater responsibilities.  With greater responsibilities comes greater privileges.  What are some privilege's???  Staying up a little later is one example.  Now, don't get me wrong... we desire our children to understand how to handle money wisely (another post), so we do have extra chores they can do to make a little Dough!  $$$

One Tolpin Family Motto is this:  

"Work Hard, Play Hard"

The Motto is all fine and dandy, but your kids needs to see you work.  

Practice what you preach... don't just have them do our weeding... go outside and weed with them. We pay $.01 per weed with roots and certain days I surprise the kids with double days or double hour and they can make more.  I find that the kids are eager to get there "responsibilities finished if they know they can look forward to earning money  by doing the extra jobs.  

Leaving a Legacy of Purposefully Working Hard & with the Right Attitude

If I grumble and complain while I do the dishes, how can I expect my children to do it with any better of an attitude.  We have to be modeling the right heart attitudes and teaching them the "Reasons behind WHY we do these things."

What Legacy Are You Leaving?

Our decisions, our training & discipleship, our passion, our purpose-fullness or lack there of, our work ethic, our political beliefs, our personal philosophies, our discipline or lack there of, our selfishness and sin, our mistakes, our conflict strategies (anger & intimidation/manipulation/interrogation/aloof judgement), our expectations, our lifestyle, our priorities, our "realness" or facade, our faith or lack there of; all these things and so much more play a part in the legacy we leave in our children.

As parents, we are imprinting what "parenting and marriage"look like in our childrens' subconscience and conscience minds.  We are their example (or role model) for how a parent is supposed "parent"and how an adult Christian is supposed "worship or pray or obey" Christ. We are their example of how to treat others with love & respect. How to practice Patience, Integrity, and Self-Control. We teach them frugality or frivaliousness.  We teach them to be concerned about the heart or to be consumed with outward appearances. We teach them how to treat friends and how to be "real."  We teach them to LEAD or Conform and Follow. Our marriage and how we treat our spouse models to our children so many different things.  It models what we beleive about Biblical Manhood & Womanhood, it models real life examples of how marriages interact and treat one another, we model how to resolve conflict, how to work as a team.  We model the good, the bad and the ugly of every area of life... dont' we.  We have an incredibly important duty & privilege.  To "help" mold the future generations, you hear this all the time.  Teachers motto is teaching the "next generation."  Parents, you still have the most influence.  You were chosen to be the parent.  Not the teacher, youth pastor, or coach.  You were given this precious gift in your child. 

  How serious are you going to take your responsibility? 

Feeling the pressure yet?  Isn't it HEAVY!  Fortunately, for us all, there is a God who is full of grace & more sufficient than necessary for redeeming our children, even with all of our mistakes and sins.  Jesus is full of Grace for us and the mistakes we make, but he can redeem them and use even our sins to bring forth fruit.  As we humbly come to Jesus, aware of our mistakes and repent.  And as we take our relationships with our children seriously enough to be humble and apologize, teaching them about the sin of even our hearts.  We are teaching them self-control, kindness, humility, forgiveness, and grace.  

Come Back again soon as I will be posting more ideas on the Leaving a Legacy.