By Joey & Carla Link
July 6, 2022
When you tell your kids to get self-control, what are you specifically telling them to do? Do your kids know? Maybe instead of saying “Don’t speak to me that way!” you might try “You need to control the tone you speak to me with. What is it about your tone that bothers me?” Or, instead of “How many times have I told you if you try to look and see what I got you for your birthday I will just take it all back to the store and you won’t get any presents”, try this “I know something is pulling on you big time to look inside of those bags and see what I got you for your birthday. How can you tell yourself to have self-control to avoid doing so?” An appropriate answer could be to go in another room while you put them away.
Self-control is one of the most needed character traits in today’s society. Yet it’s one of the most difficult to get a handle on and keep a handle on, for adults as well as kids.
How do you get your kids to work on getting self-control? We answer this in a Mom’s Notes presentation titled “Kids, Get Self-Control!” It addresses specifics for younger kids and 8 key areas for kids 7-8 years and up with many ideas for parents to work on with their kids.
If you talk to your friends, they will quickly tell you what area their children each need self-control in, whether it is their mouths, hands or feet. A key area we spend a lot of time on is how to work with your kids to get self-control of their eyes. If our kids don’t develop self-control with their eyes, they will go after what they want, when they want it because the image won’t leave their mind.
Training kids to have self-control over one’s eyes will help them, when they reach the pre-teen years (ages 11+) keep their eyes on their own paper at school, be content with the clothes they have, and make good choices about how they act or where they go and what they do, including what TV shows and/or movies they choose to watch. It would help them learn how to buy only things they can afford and to keep their thoughts pure when looking at members of the opposite sex.
There are so many things that catch our eyes. It’s amazing at what it can affect and how it impacts our kids in so many ways.
Wise Solomon said it this way in Proverbs 25:28
“Like a city whose walls are broken down
is a man who lacks self-control.”
Is your child like a city that has no walls? In biblical times, walls kept the cities protected from those who wanted to attack and take it over for their own gain. A child who hasn’t learned to control his/her eyes will grow into a teen who is vulnerable to temptation and won’t have the self-control to overcome it. Lust can overtake this teen and he goes too far with his girlfriend physically. When driving this teen leaves her cell phone on the seat next to her instead of in her bag and when it beeps, she doesn’t have the self-control to wait until she reaches her destination to look at it. You see, the walls that surrounded the city were boundaries, and that is what self-control is for the eyes. Boundaries are there to protect your kids.
Your son creates intricate things with his Legos©, yet uses these same hands to smack his sister when she touches them. Your daughter slams the vacuum cleaner into the furniture and walls when she is completing her chores, yet she creates beautiful hairstyles when playing with her sister’s hair.
Every action our kids choose to do takes self-control, not only with their eyes but with their mouths, their hands, feet, and most importantly their minds.
“For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid,
but gives us power, love and self-control.”
2 Timothy 1:7