{"id":107796,"date":"2026-08-26T08:20:19","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T06:20:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/?p=107796"},"modified":"2026-08-26T08:20:19","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T06:20:19","slug":"raising-the-next-generation-part-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/raising-the-next-generation-part-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Raising the Next Generation  &#8211; Part 3"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Muhammad \ufdfa: Humanity&#8217;s Compass in a Sea of Chaos<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>THE CHAOS AT HOME<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Raising the Next Generation <\/strong><strong>&#8211; <\/strong><em>What Are We Teaching Our Children Without Saying a Word?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>We often worry about the world our children are growing up in.<\/p>\n<p>We worry about social media, technology, peer pressure, violence, materialism and the countless influences competing for their attention.<\/p>\n<p>We ask ourselves:<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cHow do we protect our children from the world?\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>But perhaps there is another question we need to ask:<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cWhat are we giving our children that will help them navigate the world?\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Because we can&#8217;t protect our children from every difficulty they will encounter.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>We can&#8217;t control everything they see.<\/li>\n<li>We can&#8217;t choose every friend they will have.<\/li>\n<li>We can&#8217;t remove every temptation or challenge from their path.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>But we can give them something that can stay with them long after they leave our homes:<\/p>\n<p><strong>values, character, faith and a strong sense of who they are.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>And when we look at Muhammad \ufdfa, we see something incredibly beautiful in the way he interacted with children.<\/p>\n<p>He didn&#8217;t treat children as insignificant simply because they were young.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>He acknowledged them.<\/li>\n<li>He showed them affection.<\/li>\n<li>He listened to them.<\/li>\n<li>He joked with them.<\/li>\n<li>He gave them attention.<\/li>\n<li>He treated them with dignity.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And perhaps that teaches us something very important about raising children:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Children don&#8217;t only need to be instructed. They need to feel valued.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Because a child who constantly hears <em>\u201cDon&#8217;t do this, don&#8217;t do that\u201d<\/em> may know the rules, but that doesn&#8217;t necessarily mean they understand the values behind them.<\/p>\n<p>The Prophetic approach was not simply about telling people what was right.<\/p>\n<p>It was about <strong>showing them what was right through example.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>And that brings us to perhaps one of the biggest challenges facing parents today.<\/p>\n<p>We tell our children:<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cPut your phone away.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>But how often do they see us putting ours away?<\/p>\n<p>We tell them:<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cSpeak respectfully.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>But how do they hear us speaking when we&#8217;re angry?<\/p>\n<p>We tell them:<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cBe honest.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>But do they see honesty in the way we live?<\/p>\n<p>We tell them:<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u201cDon&#8217;t judge people.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>But what do they hear us saying about others?<\/p>\n<p>Because children are listening to far more than our instructions.<\/p>\n<p><strong>They are watching our lives.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>And perhaps one of the greatest lessons of the Prophetic model is that character is often <strong>caught before it is taught.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A child may forget a hundred lectures.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>But they may remember the way their father spoke to their mother.<\/li>\n<li>They may remember the way their mother responded when she was angry.<\/li>\n<li>They may remember whether their home felt safe.<\/li>\n<li>They may remember whether they could make a mistake and still be loved.<\/li>\n<li>They may remember whether their parents listened when they spoke.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And these experiences quietly shape the adults they become.<\/p>\n<p>This is why raising children isn&#8217;t simply about preparing them to succeed academically or financially.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Of course education matters.<\/li>\n<li>Of course discipline matters.<\/li>\n<li>Of course providing for them matters.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>But perhaps we also need to ask:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Are we preparing them to be good human beings?<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Are we teaching them empathy?<\/li>\n<li>Responsibility?<\/li>\n<li>Honesty?<\/li>\n<li>Respect?<\/li>\n<li>Compassion?<\/li>\n<li>Resilience?<\/li>\n<li>Humility?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And perhaps most importantly, are we helping them develop a relationship with Allah that comes from love and understanding \u2014 not simply fear?<\/p>\n<p>Because eventually, our children will grow up.<\/p>\n<p>There will come a day when we can&#8217;t tell them what to do.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>We won&#8217;t be there for every decision.<\/li>\n<li>We won&#8217;t know every conversation.<\/li>\n<li>We won&#8217;t be able to monitor every screen.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And that&#8217;s when the values we&#8217;ve helped build inside them become their compass.<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps that&#8217;s the real goal of parenting:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Not to control our children forever, but to prepare them to make good choices when we&#8217;re no longer there to guide every step.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>And this brings us back to our theme.<\/p>\n<p>The world our children will inherit may be chaotic.<\/p>\n<p>Technology will continue to change.<\/p>\n<p>Society will continue to evolve.<\/p>\n<p>New challenges will emerge that we cannot even imagine today.<\/p>\n<p>But if we raise a generation with faith, character, compassion, courage and a strong moral compass, then perhaps we don&#8217;t have to fear every storm that comes their way.<\/p>\n<p>Because they will have something more valuable than protection from every difficulty.<\/p>\n<p><strong>They will have direction.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>And perhaps that&#8217;s what Muhammad \ufdfa gives us as parents, teachers and communities:<\/p>\n<p>Not a blueprint for raising children in a perfect world.<\/p>\n<p>But a Prophetic example of raising human beings with the character to navigate an imperfect one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Muhammad \ufdfa: Humanity&#8217;s Compass in a Sea of Chaos THE CHAOS AT HOME Raising the Next Generation &#8211; What Are We Teaching Our Children Without Saying a Word? We often worry about the world our children are growing up in. We worry about social media, technology, peer pressure, violence, materialism and the countless influences competing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":107740,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-107796","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-special-feature"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pc0QIf-s2E","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-09-06 05:09:38","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/images-4.jpg?fit=447%2C447&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107796","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107796"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107796\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":107797,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107796\/revisions\/107797"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radioislam.org.za\/a\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}