Like Father, Like Son

Unfortunately, children pick up the negative habits of their parents as well as the positive ones. 

1 Kings 15.1-8

Reference:  v.3  He committed all the sins his father had done before him; his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his forefather had been. (NIV Bible)

Explore:  I help coordinate a playgroup in our local community.  This is a program run for parents and their pre-schoolers.  It provides the opportunity for the parents to meet other parents, the children to play with other children and for the parents to spend some fun time with their children.  It is amazing to watch how pre-school children will act like their parents.  We have a toy kitchen setting and so the children will mimic their mother washing the dishes.  They will mimic their father wiping the table.  While their actions are not as effective as the parents, you can see that they have been watching carefully and are now repeating their mother and father's behaviour.
Abijah, son of Rehoboam, succeeded him as king.  And while his reign lasted for three years, his contribution to the Bible only lasted eight verses.  Verse three sums up his kingship 'he committed all the sins his father had done'.

Application:  Unfortunately, children pick up the negative habits of their parents as well as the positive ones.  Now, I believe that everyone has the capacity to make a decision for themselves, but if that action has been modelled to them as children, it certainly makes it more difficult to go against the grain.  All adults should be aware that our actions are being watched by other people.  We are setting examples to those who will follow after us.  No matter what our parents were like, we have the ultimate example to follow in Jesus.  As humans we will not always get it right, however we can constantly strive to follow in the footsteps of our Heavenly Father and we will be heading in the right direction.

Prayer:  Lord, we thank you for the gift of children.  We pray that we will be wise in our guidance of them.  Amen.

What do you notice in your own life that is similar to your parents?  What aspects of your life resemble your Heavenly Father?

1 Kings