I'm seeking to understand/find a balance between being too "religious" and just keeping God the focus of life. I do not want to be legalistic, something that I can easily fall into. I've witnessed that being too strict in religion pushes others away from Jesus, but I don't want to invite trouble either by being too lenient in exposing my children to the world.
My daughter loves a princess cartoon on television. The problem is that it has a sorcerer on the show with spells and gems with supernatural powers. On the other hand, it is a show that supports being kind and respectful to others. The protective mom inside me wants to put my kiddos in a bubble and protect them from the world. But I know that keeping them ignorant isn't good for them either. One day they will face the world on their own without me and they need to be prepared. So the questions are: How much do we allow them to be exposed to? How much do we allow them to participate in? How do we prepare them without stumbling them?
She had recently selected a book about the princess from her school book order form and expressed her disappointment when she didn't receive that book in her order. I had intentionally not ordered the book because it came with an amulet like the princess uses to speak to animals. I explained to her why that I didn't order the book because it was all about magic and if we rely on magic too much, we sometimes stop relying on God. I could tell it was a subject that she wasn't quite mature enough to understand and after talking it over with my hubby, we decided that instead of banning the princess character from our home, that we would allow certain things and be careful where it led. So, on our shopping trip I picked out two books with the princess character in them and allowed my daughter to choose one in place of the one she didn't get from her book order. She was so excited and it was a good story about friendship and didn't include any supernatural themes, so we both got what we wanted!
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