Sheltering - A Thought Process of the Good and the Bad

Shelter from the Storm

Recently some of the books and reading I feel God has led me to has introduced a concept about parenting that has made me question many of the things I have done as a mom.  I am researching and praying because I am very careful now about how I parent my children.  The concept is sheltering, not only from the storms of this life but from the potential storms.

Most parents shelter their young.  We cover our babies with blankets to keep them from warm in the winter cold.  We hold the hands of our toddlers to keep them from running in front of a car in the store parking lot.  As Christians, we pray for our children.  We try to be careful about the friends in their lives.  Some of us even homeschool; and one of the reasons we homeschool is to keep our children away from influences in the schools, the peers and even the philosophies that run counter to our beliefs.

Sheltering is not a foreign concept for parents.  Throughout time parents have sheltered their kids from potential harm.  It is only in the last few decades that the term "Sheltering" has taken on negative connotations.  Parents that shelter their children are often made to feel that they aren't being very responsible parents because their "sheltered" kids aren't able to fit in with the world.  It used to be that homeschooling parents were told that their children would never fit in because the kids were educated at home instead of in schools with 30 other children in a class.  Older, high school students that weren't a part of the social system of a school were definitely looked at as not normal.  Since I have begun homeschooling my high school-aged daughter, she has been asked repeatedly, "Don't you miss your friends?", and "What about Prom?", and "Don't you want to graduate with our classmates?" May parents are called to homeschool but then stick their children in multiple activities each to make up for what they feel their children may be missing at school... that peer interaction.  I find that ironic that they took their children out of school to protect them from worldly influences, then put their children in a bunch of activities where the children are around the same children.  I'm not saying that participation in activities here and there is wrong.  I just believe it is overdone.

I guess going against the norm, while it has drawn questions and criticism, has been a bit of a shock to me.  However, the results I've seen in the one year since Tasha came home to do high school has been amazing.  The same could be said for my ten year old.  When I brought her home in the beginning of third grade, she was a shy eight year old that was having behavioral issues at school.  Now, while there have been ups and downs, she is becoming who God made her to be... not who she was being turned into at the school.

Are my children sheltered?  Well, a bit I suppose.  They are in limited activities and aren't in public school.  Yet, the reading I have been led to actually says that children should be sheltered more than they are until they are old enough and educated enough to shelter themselves from the world and run to God as their protection.  I've had a rough time with this here and there.  I've watched good, Christian children fall away by not being sheltered.  It doesn't take much some days for the draw of the world to get a hold of their hearts.  On the flip side I have also heard the stories of the sheltered kids that go wild when they reach adulthood.  I guess it all depends on the kid and on the approach.

I have seen the result of kids that have been sheltered.  In a loving home that is family oriented with lots of activities that the family shares, the kids relate with a lot of different people and are very well-adjusted with a deep love for Jesus.  In other cases, where the kids was just forbidden to do much of anything and felt they lived under a legalistic, rules-oriented life, they rebelled and went away from God.  Sadly, this is why "Sheltering" has such a negative tone in our society.

This is something that I feel God has led me to, but I don't know what direction this is going yet.  My oldest girls are teenagers.  One of them is beginning college.  The other is only one school year away from graduating high school.  I feel the weight of negative parenting choices with them.  I am blessed because they love God anyway.  However, they carry in them things that they have to resolve.  They carry the rejection of a father and the anger and self-doubt that goes with it.  They lived with parents that lived in the world for the first part of their lives.    They saw mom and dad live lives not dedicated to serving anything but themselves.  Dad was in secular rock bands.  Mom was wanting to have a strong family, but in a way that was shallow and prideful.  It definitely wasn't Christ honoring.

Should my children be sheltered more?  One of the books I'm reading discusses many things in depth;  What is good sheltering and what is negative sheltering, what replaces some of the world's experiences and why those experiences aren't positive, and How to keep the hearts of your children while they grow for Jesus.

Every step my husband and I take in parenting children is prayed through and thought about and discussed.  We've made a lot of mistakes, even down to teaching our children responsibility.  We are hoping to minimize and change things for our younger children to the best that God will allow. The directions that God sends us may not make sense to us initially.  It didn't make sense to homeschool a high school student starting in her junior year.  It didn't make sense to many to even pull my third grade girl and begin homeschooling her.  She was honor roll and, on the surface, appeared to be doing well.  Many things about God don't make sense on the surface.  It is only later that things are revealed.  Some things are never revealed here on Earth.  In Heaven we will find out all.