Building relationship with your kids makes for great fun together when they are teens. I don’t get people when they talk about how awful the teen years are because although those years have challenges my experience has been they are the opposite of awful.
When you have come alongside your kids consistently, taught them the truth of who God is, who the enemy of God is and how they walk through life with a target on their back the teen years become daily opportunity for them to realize, “Dang, my parents know some stuff!” And it gives them an opportunity to make failures and wins right there in your home so you can help them process!
That relationship building from a young age leads to lots of opportunity to hang out and learn from each other!
Every now and then my 17 year old son says, “Hey mom, let’s go out on a date!” Our last one was out to get Chinese food and to a movie. Who would have thought that a Chinese fortune cookie would afford us the opportunity to discuss a simple truth that so many of us get dead wrong?!
We are not put on this planet to be happy. Which is hard to believe based on all the messaging we get from the world constantly. What a blessing (and a challenge) that we are told not to conform to the patterns of this world.
The worst fortune cookie ever told us, “Enjoy life! It is better to be happy than wise.”
Who wants to laugh hysterically with me on that one?
My son and I then discussed the difference between being happy and choosing joy. We also discussed wisdom verses foolishness. And we wrapped it up with who will we allow to guide our steps? Fortune cookies, the world, or God’s word.
And yes, I did tell him that there are far too many “happy” twenty year olds living in their parents basement because working a job and working through the trials that God puts man through, to grow them up and towards Him, did not make them happy.
That fortune cookie predicts doom to whoever would follow that hollow advice. (How about that symbolism? Yeah!)
On a random note…because I am random so I can do that.
Please know…that this declaration that happy is not the goal is in no way a contradiction to the Duck Commanders declaration that we all be “Happy, Happy, Happy” … that is altogether different. He is a wise man that lives out God’s word and he gets it!
In our house we are happy, happy, happy too!
The reason Phil, and we, can figure stuff out is because we daily lean our ear towards wisdom, God’s wisdom.
Which leads to joy…which leads to happy, happy, happy!
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