Planting Sunflowers: Raising Children to Seek the Son

Raising children is a harder job than I ever imagined. I say goodnight most nights feeling like I barely sputtered across the finish line, often holding onto regrets from the day, all my pretty failures and missed moments dangling from my weary eyelids.

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Somedays, I feel like I’m trying to stand still in the middle of a child-based hurricane. All I know how to do for sure is hold onto the anchor.

Hebrews 6:19 ESV / We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain,

(If you came here looking gardening tips, I apologize, the title is figurative. You can find great gardening tips on A Pinch of Homestead; I have a garden in the sense that I picked out pretty plants at Home Depot and occasionally water them.)

So what is this post about then?

The Importance of Raising Children to Seek the Son

When I first began blogging, I made business cards for a speaking engagement. I used the bright sunshine yellow sunflower design because something about it spoke to me.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I remembered sunflowers track the sunlight through the day. I liked the metaphorical imagery of the flowers looking for the light. However, when I sat down to write about it, I discovered that mature sunflowers aren’t actually very helioptropic.

I was so disappointed. In my mind, I had this beautiful image of Christians striving to face God’s light in all circumstances. However, a field of mature sunflowers only appears to be facing the sun if the photographer takes the picture in the morning. In this beautiful picture, we can clearly see all the flowers facing away from the setting sun.

Then I kept reading. Turns out the bud of the flower is the most heliotropic. The bud searches for the light from dawn until dusk. The stem is flexible allowing the bud to grow toward the sunlight.

Once the buds mature and bloom, the stems become firm. They can no longer track the sun all day. Yet, the buds bloom facing east. They “learned” from which direction the light will come each morning.

Wow! The metaphor I had pictured paled in comparison to the one God had in mind.

I write about raising children to face Gods’ light, learning to seek Him in everything we do. Right now, my daughter is open-hearted, open-minded and loves Jesus deeply, but someday her thinking will become more firmly ingrained in her heart.

Parents must focus on raising children in the knowledge and fear of the Lord so as their stems solidify, they are facing His way.

Proverbs 22:6 ESV / Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.

Together, we seek Him when we face challenges, but I want to make sure her faith solidifies so as an adult, she can face the difficulties of a fallen world.

My daughter struggles with her emotions and her sinful nature as we all do. I want to teach her how to go to God’s word with her fears and failings.

Inherently, children seem to seek Jesus and will look for His light. If there is any source of His light in a child’s life bright enough to combat the darkness, they will hang onto that light.

Oh, to teach her to hold onto the Son, to seek His face during the dark times in my daughter’s life. Some of the darkness will be of her own making and some are just the consequences of a fallen world. For her to know victory in the Lord is a promise that my work with her is not in vain.

Psalm 30:5b ESV  “…Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning.”

The joy of the morning sun gradually bringing life to a field of sunflowers paints the perfect picture of redemption and grace in my heart, a celebration of facing the new day, leaving behind the darkness.

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I pray for my daughter to experience that joy for herself as she grows, but pray she does so completely on her own, just because she loves Him.

1 Corinthians 15:57-58 “But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.”

Today, I’m planting sunflowers, planting seeds in her heart. My little bud is in Son training, learning what light looks like, because when she blooms I want her to be steadfastly facing Son light.

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