Christianity Today Bible Study: The Myth of the Perfect Parent

Christianity Today Bible studies are available for download at ChristianBibleStudies.com. This one, “The Myth of the Perfect Parent,” is based on an article in the January 2010 CT.

Christianity Today has graciously allowed me to post the studies I have written to this site, usually one or two a month. If you would like to use them for anything other than your own spiritual growth, I ask you to download them at the CT Bible study site mentioned above. You can go here to purchase the study for your group.

According to Leslie Leyland Fields in “The Myth of the Perfect Parent,” Bible-believing parents have imbibed the philosophy of John B. Watson, an early 20th-century psychologist who boasted he could train any child. Christians often follow the same kind of behaviorism, giving it a Christian veneer with selected Bible verses.

And yet many children in evangelical homes are not “turning out” the way we hope or expect. Plus, many biblical saints were either products of bad parenting or bad parents themselves. And if we judge God’s success as a parent by how his children turn out, then he doesn’t pass our test either. Our expectations of parenting are clearly off-kilter and need to be rethought.

Here is a link to the study for your personal, individual use. Your feedback is always welcome.

HT: Thanks to Mary DeMuth for allowing me to use this link.

About Stan Guthrie

Stan Guthrie is an editor at large for Christianity Today magazine and for the Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview. His latest book is God's Story in 66 Verses. He also is author of All that Jesus Asks: How His Questions Can Teach and Transform Us, Missions in the Third Millennium: 21 Key Trends for the 21st Century, and A Concise Guide to Bible Prophecy. He is co-author of The Sacrament of Evangelism. Besides authoring, writing, and editing books, Stan is a literary agent, bringing together good authors, good books, and good publishers. Stan writes the monthly Priorities colum for BreakPoint.org. He has appeared on National Public Radio's €œTell Me More,€ WGN's Milt Rosenberg program, and many Christian shows, including The Eric Metaxas Show and Moody Radio'€™s €œNew Day Florida.€ A licensed minister and an inspirational speaker, he served as moderator for the Christian Book Expo panel discussion, Does the God of Christianity Exist, and What Difference Does It Make?
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