Why Spiritual Formation Is the Missing Piece in Christian Parenting

What If Parenting Is About Who You’re Becoming?

In a world saturated with parenting advice, it’s easy to get lost in the noise. Be consistent. Be gentle. Be authoritative. Be fun. Raise confident kids. Raise kind kids. Raise kids who love Jesus.

And do it all while staying sane, preserving your marriage, and—somehow—not losing yourself.

But what if we’ve been missing the most important piece?

What if raising spiritually rooted children isn’t just about what we teach them—but about who we’re becoming?

Parenting Isn’t Just About Discipline. It’s About Formation.

Most Christian parenting frameworks emphasize behavior—how to train, correct, motivate, and guide kids toward godly choices. While well-intentioned, this approach often misses the heart of discipleship. True spiritual growth isn’t behavior management—it’s inner transformation.

Dallas Willard famously defined spiritual formation as “the process of being conformed to the image of Christ for the sake of others.” This kind of formation isn’t separate from parenting—it’s embedded in it. Every tantrum, bedtime battle, and car ride conversation isn’t just shaping our kids; it’s shaping us.

What if we began to see parenting not as a series of strategies, but as a sacred invitation?

Spiritual Formation Is for the Whole Family, Not Just the Individual

For decades, spiritual formation has been seen as a deeply personal journey—quiet time, prayer life, inner healing. But the spiritual life is not just individual; it’s communal. It affects every relationship, every system, and especially the family.

If we believe that God uses relationships to transform us, then parenting may be the most spiritually formational experience of all. Our children’s needs, behaviors, and emotions don’t just demand our attention—they reveal our attachments, our assumptions, and even our unresolved wounds. Parenting becomes the crucible where the Spirit does some of His deepest work.

When we view the family not just as a unit to manage, but as a spiritual ecosystem, everything shifts.

What Sets Spiritual Formation Apart from Psychology and Discipleship

While parenting resources often pull from child psychology, attachment theory, or behavior-based discipleship models, spiritual formation integrates all of these—and transcends them.

• Like psychology, it values self-awareness.
  
• Like discipleship, it prioritizes becoming like Christ.
  
• But spiritual formation also includes the contemplative, the relational, and the integrative: mind, body, and soul.
  

Spiritual formation houses tools like the Enneagram, trauma-informed practices, Internal Family Systems theory, and relational neuroscience—but roots them all in the greater goal of God-awareness and soul-deep transformation.

In short, it’s the most holistic approach to parenting we have.

“You’re trying to form your kids without letting Me form you.”
— A moment of divine conviction that changed my parenting forever.

The Spiritual Director’s Gift: Listening in Parenting

In spiritual direction, the goal is not advice but awareness. A trained spiritual director listens deeply—to both the person and the Spirit—and gently calls attention to the movements of God within the story.

What if we applied that same posture to parenting?

Instead of managing every meltdown or micromanaging every moment, we slow down. We listen. We become curious about what God might be doing in us through this moment—not just what’s going wrong in our child.

When we adopt a spiritual director’s posture in our homes, we begin to model what formation looks like: quiet attentiveness, honest reflection, and tender transformation.

What Parenting Formed by God Can Look Like

It looks like taking a breath before reacting.

It looks like asking, “What is this moment forming in me?” rather than “How do I fix this?”

It looks like realizing that our identity as parents isn’t rooted in performance but in presence.

It looks like surrendering to the slow work of God—in our children and in ourselves.

And slowly, almost imperceptibly, the fruit of the Spirit starts to grow not just in our kids, but in our own hearts.

The Invitation: From Performance to Presence

If you’re tired of striving. If you’re overwhelmed by all the right methods. If you’re longing for something deeper—start here:

Let God form you.

Let the Spirit meet you in the laundry room, the school pickup line, the sleepless nights. Let spiritual formation become your framework—not just for your own faith journey, but for how you raise your children.

You don’t need more pressure. You need more presence.

And that’s exactly where God is waiting to meet you.

About the Author
Julie Ann Luse is a writer, podcast host, spiritual director-in-training, and mom of three with over 25 years of ministry experience. She holds a master’s degree in Christian Spiritual Formation with an emphasis in children’s spirituality and relational neuroscience. As the voice behind the Parent Forward Podcast, she helps parents recognize the sacred in the ordinary and discover how family life can become a space for soul-deep transformation—one faithful step at a time.

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What Is Spiritual Formation and Why It Matters in Parenting
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