Praying for your children - CFN newsletter 17

CHRISTIAN FAMILY NETWORK NEWSLETTER 17

Hi there – and welcome to this week's newsletter, which weighs in at just 14k, isn't called Leo, and won't (hopefully) keep you up all night! But we hope it will leave you informed, inspired, invigorated and entertained!

It's been quite a week, what with the Blair baby – and an England cricket win (and you thought the first one was a surprise!). Yet the joys and challenges of family life continue. Thanks for all your messages of encouragement, as well as your questions and queries – we're getting through them as quickly as we can.

Our website will shortly record its 100,000th hit of the month, and we're beavering away behind the scenes to bring you stacks more content, ideas and ways to use it. Do tell us what you'd like to see, and we'll do our best to oblige!

The Network continues to grow, and as it does the influence we can have and the benefits we can offer will grow too. So if you haven't joined and received your user name and password, please click here. And if you can use more CFN leaflets for your church, mail us and we'll send them out to you.

Why not check out the Bulletin Board this weekend, and make your debut? You'll find a warm welcome!

Russ Bravo
Christian Family Network

PS Don't forget - you can send this newsletter on to a friend by clicking the Forward button on your browser and typing in their e-mail address. To receive it direct for themselves, they just send a message to join-cfn-newsletter@mail.cnet.org

THIS WEEK'S INSIGHT Back to top

Ways to pray for your children

In an extract from her recent book Children and Prayer - a shared pilgrimage (Alpha), Betty Shannon Cloyd gives some practical tips on how to pray for your youngster

What a legacy it is for our children to know that we are praying for them! When we have doubts as to whether praying for our children does any good, we can look at some strong examples from the past and the results speak for themselves.

For many years, as a young man, Augustine gave up on God and lived a life of drunkenness and immorality. Monica, his mother, never, however, gave up on him and continued to pray for her son. She also asked others to pray for him. Finally, at age 31, Augustine became a Christian and went on to become one of the early bishops of the church.

Catherine Booth was the wife of General William Booth of the Salvation Army. Before her children were born, she promised God that each one of them would be God's. She continued to pray fervently for them throughout their lives and gave them a great legacy of prayer. As a result, they have served faithfully in the Salvation Army throughout the years.

To be able to pray for and with our children is one of the greatest gifts that we can give them. I believe that our prayers for and with our children give to them a sense of rootedness in their lives. Children desperately need this if they are to find security and belonging in life. To pray for loved ones and friends, to talk about our faith, to lift the child to God in prayer all bring to the child a sense of connectedness with others and with God. Sometimes our faithfulness in prayer can ground our children until their faith has had time to develop deep enough roots.

There are no measurements or scales to measure how our prayers affect our children, but it is certain that there is power in our persistent prayer for and with our children. Because many persons throughout the ages have attested to this fact, we are given assurance that it is certainly worth the effort.

  • For the whole article, and help in praying for and with your children, click HERE
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THIS WEEK'S NEWS

£100,000 grant from Home Office for parenting group

The Home Office has given a grant of almost £100,000 to Gosport-based charity Positive Parenting Publications, in recognition of their work promoting good parenting and family values.

The funding, over two years, will help the Christian-led group develop their innovative national parenting programme which offers special sessions to parents as part of the induction process at Primary School. PPP also works closely with churches and health professionals on parenting support. Many churches providing parenting courses are reporting ongoing links with those outside the church and a growth in Alpha courses as a result.

SITES WORTH SEEING

Waverley Abbey House, home to CWR, March for Jesus and Pioneer, is gaining a growing reputation for its business and professional education arm, Waverley Learning. Balancing Home and Work is one of a number of programmes offered alongside retreats and courses on leadership, change, pressure and career development. CFN members can check out Director Geoff Shattock's piece in Members Zone Advice section.

Making waves with their new album Strange Blue Thing are popular Christian band As If ..., who have regularly played Raves in the Nave at some of the UK's West Country cathedrals. Check out our review on the Members Zone.

  • There are more sites in this week's Webwatch in the Members Zone
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STATS WORTH KNOWING

Teenagers and the occult

One in four UK teenagers has a fascination with the occult, which is fuelled by the large number of sites dedicated to the supernatural, according to an April MORI poll. 50% of the 2600 children aged 11-16 surveyed by MORI for the Association of Teachers and Lecturers admitted having some interest in the occult. For half of these, the level of interest went beyond the curious and was said to be 'very strong'.
The ATL was concerned that unsupervised Internet access meant young people were finding it easier to visit websites relating to 'unsavoury topics' such as the occult.
Source: The Times, April 22

THIS WEEK'S CHUCKLE

Some received wisdom from grandparents ...

Now that I'm older, here's what I've discovered:

  • I started out with nothing, and I still have most of it.
  • If all is not lost, where is it?
  • It is easier to get older than it is to get wiser.
  • Some days you're the dog; some days you're the lamp-post.
  • The only difference between a rut and a grave is the depth.
  • If God wanted me to touch my toes, he would have put them on my knees.
  • The only time the world beats a path to your door is when you're in the loo.
  • Age is relative - most of my relatives are old

And finally, The Senility Prayer ...
God grant me the senility to forget the people I never liked anyway, the good fortune to run into the ones that I do, and the eyesight to tell the difference.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

Actor Denzil Washington on the importance of family: "Life is family to me. We go to church together as a family and that's a major part of our life, too. Pauletta (his wife) is a great woman. She's very Christian, very much the rock of our family in that regard. She leads all the prayers. She taught the children their prayers and they know more than I do."
(The Times, interview by Martyn Palmer)

WISDOM FOR LIVING

Don't just listen to what someone is saying.
Listen to why they are saying it.

CHRISTIAN FAMILY NETWORK THIS WEEK (MEMBERS ZONE)

  • On the bulletin board: your messages for Tony and Cherie Blair, is musical chairs really bad for children? , all-age worship: do you enjoy it or endure it? plus family holidays: tell us the best you've ever had
  • Worknet's Geoff Shattock on balancing your busy life
  • Webwatch Index: top sites for kids, new network for Sunday School teachers, unmetered ISPs and more
  • Reviews: Doug Horley, As If ..., Jaci Velasquez (Music); McGee's New Media Kids Bible(PC/Mac software)

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