Parenting – Part 1
March 12, 2000
Dear Friends:
The last thing anyone with a nine year old and a six year old need to do is dispense advice on raising children. Your kids haven’t been through the teen years, college years nor have they been baptized. So if I were to share with you some thoughts on kids, it would have to be either second hand from other parents or from the Bible itself. And so it is.
Here is a compilation of a few thoughts that I have gleaned from the Bible or what I perceived to be successful parents over the years.
One of the first things I notice about successful parents is that they walk their talk. They not only talk to their children about what is right and wrong and how to live their lives, but they show them. So many times our children end up being little carbon copies of us. No one sits with their children and teaches them bad habits. They just pick them up no matter how carefully hidden. The parent who says do what I say and not what I do is in for trouble. As parents, we need to take an extra long look at who we are and what baggage we are carrying around with us. Long after we are gone our children will still be carrying it around with them!
God not only told us what to do, He showed us. He sent His son to the earth to show us what He was like and how to behave. “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14) “Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father?” (John 14:9)
One of the first things a new parent wants to know is how to discipline children. In looking at successful parents, I noticed a wide variety in how they handled discipline. One of the consistent things however was that they could correct and control with a word.
When I asked people how they trained their children so well, one of the consistent responses was that if they, the parent, ever said something, they would stick by it. They might tell the child something like “if you touch that, you will get a spanking.” If the child touches it, there is no question as to what will happen. Everyone has seen the parent which idly threatens a child over and over with no results. The unintentional lesson in those cases is that the parent does not keep their word. The parents do not need to be obeyed because nothing will happen if they don’t.
God has provided consistency for His children. He cannot lie. “…my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.” (Is. 55:11) God does “who does not change like shifting shadows.”
We need to provide consistency for our children. Our word must not return unto us void because we are shifting like the shadows.
We touched briefly on the hot topic of corporeal punishment. We’ll start with that next week.
Have a great week!
Comments»
No comments yet.