How To Bless Your Children by Brian Haynes

The righteous who walks in his integrity- blessed are his children after him. -Proverbs 20:7

Could it be that simple? If you want to bless your children be a righteous man that consistently walks with integrity? So says the wisdom of Solomon in the book of Proverbs.

What does it mean for the righteous to walk with integrity? A righteous person is by definition someone who walks with integrity. This is an unusual way of living in 21st century America. This week I set down with my daughter to set up an email address for her to use. As we set it up I read a small blurb from the FCC suggesting it was against the law for anyone under the age of 13 to have an email account through webmail providers like gmail, hotmail, yahoo, etc. That was a bit confusing to me because many of my daughters friends already have email accounts and have had them for quite some time. I told my daughter we would just have to wait until she was thirteen. She asked me if that meant all of her friends under the age of 13 lied or their parents lied to set up the email address? I said, “Looks that way.” It’s a little thing, maybe.

Integrity in the little things are important not just as a matter of personal responsibility but also as a demonstration of righteousness to the next generation. For Christian parents, integrity is a key indicator as to the authenticity of our faith. Does our faith in Jesus Christ as King impact every part of our lives or does he only influence certain compartments? An authentic faith is fully submitted to Jesus as King. Working hard to teach our kids the Scripture and the right way of living is both intentional and important. However all of that is out the window as soon as we claim to be righteous but fail to demonstrate integrity.

If we want our kids to understand the blessing of being fully submitted to Christ they have to see that modeled in us. Want your kids to be blessed? As a person made righteous by the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of King Jesus, walk in integrity! Your children who come after you will be blessed.