Give Them Grace

I am currently reading Give Them Grace by Elyse Fitzpatrick and Jessica Thompson. Though I have not finished reading the book yet, and cannot write a full book review, I highly recommend it! The authors' proposition is that anytime we try to "make" our children be good we are merely extending the law--a law that cannot and will not save them, and will instead turn them into hypocrites and rebels. What children need, what we need, is grace. We need to realize that we can do nothing on our own--we cannot even be good on our own.

There is much to process and digest in this book. I am humbled and convicted and see so many areas where I do not preach the gospel to myself, let alone to my children. I look forward to finishing this book and probably re-reading it again to fully integrate the principles inside it.

If I have not piqued your interest enough, here is a quote that gets to the heart of the matter (and the book):

We are commanded [to teach our children God's law] but not to make them good. We are commanded to give them the law so that they will be crushed by it and see their need for a Savior. The law won't make them good. It will make them despair of ever being good, and in that way it will make them open to the love, sacrifice and welcome of their Savior, Jesus Christ.

Have you read this book? If so, what did you learn from it? Do you find it true that too many times we try to make our children obey the law without pointing them to the grace of the cross, the grace that has been given to us, the grace without which we would be dead no matter how good we are?