30 Day Sibling Challenge - Day One

For the month of June I will be postponing the Psalm 119 study. The next 30 days devotionals will post for this challenge. If you would rather receive the entire challenge in word document please let me know and I will send the attachment to you.

Also please forgive me for any typos. This was done over a short period of time. This is the rough draft. I will be making corrections as I go over this with my own children.

As the nature of a new study goes, day one is longer than the other days. However these are fairly short and can be as little or as much as you would like them to be. I am praying for us all on this journey!

First I must say that this is simply a humble experiment, 30 days to test and see if peace can reign in our home. I believe it can Bible study friend. I am praying with you on this journey. May we have children who desire to not only keep the peace with one another but to truly love one another.  May we raise peacemakers. May this forever change them and make them more like Christ.

My heart’s desire is not for this to be a moralistic attempt, though some of our children are not yet believers so unfortunately it will be that for them. However, for those whose hearts have already been drawn to God it should hopefully help them to fix their eyes on Him and desire to walk in peace because it pleases Him. That alone should be enough for them to do it. They should desire to please the One who first loved them and called them to Himself not out of obligation but out of that lavished love He has for them. As parents mainly I want you to direct them to this truth and remind them of it. This is not a legalistic attempt for those never work for long. We are dealing with issues of the heart and uprooting sinfulness through this experiment. Only the love of Christ and the gospel message can inspire true and lasting change. Let us not lose sight of this.

I will employ the S.P.A. method often for them. It stands for Stop, Pray, and then Act. When we feel something uncomfortable rising up in our hearts it is a cue to stop, pray about it with God and make it come into agreement with His truths then Act. They need to learn this as an act of self-control.

Now, I will give you something to do also as parents called Parent’s Action, to help you facilitate this with your children. We must be in agreement that we will absolutely not allow strife in the home. There must be a stern penalty for it. As keepers and watchers of the home we must be attentive to this.

Simply this is 30 days’ worth of devotions to do together as a family. We will be doing them in the month of June. They should be done consecutively as to help create the habit of being peacemakers. Let’s get started!

Day One

You may be doing this because you want to have a better relationship with your siblings. You may be doing it because your parents are forcing you too. Either way, I pray you will really take it seriously and embrace your role as a peace maker. Jesus said, “God blesses those who work for peace, for they will be called the children of God” (Matthew 5:9, NLT).

Fighting and arguing is sinful behavior. It is wrong in the eyes of God. Yet daily we may do it without much thought to how it hurts God. All sin hurts God, Jesus had to die and experience separation on the cross for it. Though He did it because of His great love for us (John 3:16). “If you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9). Do you believe this? If so you are a child of God and should be willing to let Him be the Lord or Ruler of your life. This means we must die to our selfish desires daily. We often want our own way yet we must chose the way the Jesus instructs us to go which may be different than what we initially want. Yet if we belong to Him we do have the ability to deny ourselves and follow Him. In fact Jesus says, ““If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross, and follow me.  If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it” (Matthew 16:24-25). You must believe these things to do this successfully. 

I have heard it said that if you do something for 21 days straight it will create a habit in your life. I am hoping these next 30 days will create a habit of seeking peace in your life. I am praying for you as you work through this study! I am excited for you and what it will accomplish anytime we spend time thinking about and doing what God says to us through His word.

Devotional Day One – Why do we Fight?
“What is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Don’t they come from the evil desires at war within you? You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous of what others have, but you can’t get it, so you fight and wage war to take it away from them. Yet you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it.  And even when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure.” ~James 4:1-3, NLT

Ever wonder what causes fights? Often I like to say, “well it was her fault!” or “I didn’t do anything!” However, this is the wrong way to look at fighting. We must first take a look at our own hearts. I know, I hate to hear this! But it is what you must do if you want to live at peace with others.

First, what is the answer from verse one about where fights and quarrels come? Under line the answer. There are several reasons. List them here.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Break it down. There are six problems to address here. We will look at two a day for the next 3 days.
1-You want something you do not have.
This is coveting. It is one of the ten commandments that God lists. The reason? When we covet something someone else has we are not loving God or the other person. God is the provider of all good gifts. Every good gift we have is because God has given it to us (James 1:17). When we desire the things that others have (the good gifts that God has given them) we are saying in our hearts to God, “I do not like the things You have given me God, I want that instead.” It is like a spoiled child who never has enough.

If you pay attention to the warning signal within yourself you can stop this. When you start to become discontent with what you have when you look at someone else’s thing you feel uneasiness in your body. It is like when you are about to throw a temper tantrum you can feel it rising. You must stop it. Otherwise it will move into a fight. It is something in your heart you need to control. If not then it will move to the next thing we will talk about from the James verse.

2-You scheme and kill to get it.
Now reading this you will probably think, I am not going to kill someone! This does not apply to me. However, Jesus tells us that if we hate someone in our heart that it is committing murder. This coveting can move into hating or murdering someone in our hearts. We must not do it!

Scheming is manipulating to get what you want. It is like stealing candy from a baby. You think of a plan to go to them with something that looks more appealing to get what you want. This too is wrong. It is not being satisfied with the gifts that God has given you. It is a form of lying and trickery all rooted in pure selfishness. It is the furthest thing from Christlikeness.

Today’s Action
Each day there will be an action for you to take to help you in your relationship with your family by living at peace. Each action will be based on the Scripture that you have studied. I want you to focus on this all day.

Use the S.P.A. Method. This means when something comes up in your heart that is uncomfortable (those signs in your body I spoke of earlier) stop yourself. Don’t say anything just stop and think. Pray to God about what is going on. Then once you are able to have self-control and respond the way that would please God, and then Act. Again, if you are a follower of Christ, you will have the power of the Holy Spirit living in you, you can take control of your emotions. So all day listen to what is going on in your heart when certain things happen. Focus on Stopping, Praying, And then Acting. That is the S.P.A. method. Simple right?

Parent’s Action
Help your children identify these cues and direct them accordingly. Also, you practice this as well. We must all be peacemakers too for this to work with our children.