Parenting Series 8: Self and Parenting (Part 2)

These two lessons aimed to assist parents in grasping what the self is in order to more clearly aid their child in understanding who they are. We discussed that there are matters essential to our identity with uniquely essential parts of our identity given to us in union with Christ. Beyond the essential matters of identity, there remain “accidental” portions of our identity which require careful instruction from parents to children. Despite the transient nature of these accidental qualities, our essential qualities as Christian, human persons should be brought to bear on these matters. Because of this, every quality about our persons (and every introspective identity thought) should ultimately have its terminus on God, increasing His beauty in our minds and decreasing our prideful self-absorption and idolatry.