A Little Harris-y:
Growing Godly Children Pt.3
Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it.
- Proverbs 22:6 -
Love between parents and children is one of the fruits of the Gospel. The final prophet before God’s years of silence between the testaments promised that before God’s great day (the day of Jesus' ministry), He would send a powerful prophet like Elijah. Concerning that prophet, the last verse of the Old Testament says, “He will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and smite the land with a curse.” (NASB, Mal. 4:6, emphasis added). Four hundred years later, this prophecy was fulfilled through John the Baptist, whose call to repentance from sin led the nation of Israel in a sweeping revival (Matt. 3:1-12, Luke 1:17). Considering what God said through Malachi, genuine relationship between parents and their children must have been part of the evidence of their true repentance. This makes sense when considering that the earthly relationship between a father and child is a picture of God’s relationship with mankind. God’s heart for humanity has always been for us to live in relationship with Him as our Heavenly Father. This can be seen from the beginning of the story when Adam and Eve first fell. Instead of staying aloof or impersonally condemning them, God came directly to Adam and Eve and engaged them in conversation by probing them with questions (Gen.3:8-13). God is pursuing relationship with the people He created, that He might adopt them as His children, and the closer people come to Him as their Heavenly Father, the more love is restored to earthly fatherhood/motherhood.
Providing the Nutrients
If parenting were a garden, the seeds would be the teaching, pulling weeds would be discipline/punishment, and the soil itself would be the relationship between the child and the parent. You cannot genuinely expect to get a good harvest from seeds planted on concrete, even if they were perfect seeds and you pulled every weed. Likewise, you cannot expect your parenting to help your children bear the fruit of righteousness without granting them the life-nutrition of your love and care. Making this same point, the Apostle James says that our anger cannot produce God’s righteousness(1:19-20), but that “the seed whose fruit is righteousness is sown in peaceby those who make peace” (3:18). If we desire to help our children grow in godliness, we must approach harmony with them from a place of personal tranquility (don’t let the words harmony and tranquility scare you, they all can be translated from the same Greek word translated to peace in the above passage, see Swanson). Parenting, like all relationships, is similar to accounting. Every display of love, care, and friendship acts as a relational deposit, but every correction, no matter how necessary, acts as a withdrawal. You cannot withdraw from an empty account.
Here are ways to make relational deposits in our kids' lives (all of which come from Chapman’s five love languages).
Quality Time – I have placed this one first because I believe it is the most important. For every other type of love becomes quality time when our hearts are truly engaged. But when our hearts are not involved, all attempts to love become hypocrisy that can be felt. We can spend quality time with our kids by inviting them to join us in what we do, such as taking them to our workplaces. We can also spend quality time with our kids by engaging them in activities they enjoy, like coloring pictures with them when they are young. Take the time to play with your children; it will be worth it. Personally, I try to spend quality time with my children by taking walks with them before work in the morning on a rotating schedule.
Words of Affirmation – I cannot emphasize this point enough. All too often, the only words kids hear from their parents are words of correction and disapproval. Instead, we should make a habit of finding things in our kids to praise and thank. Your kids are not likely to share their feats and their achievements with you if they do not know you are capable of being proud of them.
Acts of Service – One of the ways we show our children love is by serving them. This is surely the type of love that parents give to their children the most, but that children feel the least. Although kids never really know the sacrifices parents make for them, we should still serve them sacrificially, knowing that it is service to God and knowing that they will appreciate it one day when they grow up.
Gifts – As you know, another way we befriend our children is by giving them gifts. The more thoughtful we are in what we give our children, the more they will receive our love. Gifts are powerful, and the more the gift displays how well the giver knows the receiver, the more powerful they are. Remembering that the giver is in the gift helps me give despite my lack of natural tendency in this area. (However, I have noticed that gifts are often over-given in America to compensate for the lack of quality time, and because children there often get whatever they beg for… which they shouldn’t.)
Physical Touch – Touching our children physically can help them know our love emotionally. Holding hands, giving hugs, patting backs, kissing cheeks, even popping toes, when done with affection, all say “I love you.” Our family has a nightly ritual that helps us keep up with this; Every night, as the last step of devotions, we sing either the Doxology or I Love You Lord, while each of the kids exchanges hugs and kisses with Noelle and me.
Concerning our relationship with our children, consider the following:
Does your child know that they make you smile? – If not, they will eventually find someone else they do please.
Connect before you correct – Act like God in the Garden of Eden and seek to engage your child in a relationship before correcting him or her.
Seek first to understand before seeking to be understood –Our children will not listen to us when we do not have a habit of knowing them and connecting with them by allowing them to express themselves to us (See Covey). (This is not always applicable, especially when children are throwing fits.)
Love and Approval are not always the same thing – True love seeks someone’s good. Sin separates people from God and is never in anyone’s best interest. When your child is engaged in sin, they need your love through undying care and the establishment and maintenance of boundaries, not through acceptance of the things that are destroying them.
Bibliography:
Chapman, Gary. The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love That Lasts. Updated edition, Northfield Publishing, 2015.
Covey, Stephen R. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change. 30thanniversary edition, Simon & Schuster, 2020.
New American Standard Bible: 1995Update. TheLockman Foundation, 1995.
Swanson, James. Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains: Greek (New Testament), Electronic ed., Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997.
A Final Note: To see just how important parental love is to God, try to find the context of the first time the word love appears in the Old Testament, and find the New Testament’s first uses of the word Love by seeing where it first appears in each of the four Gospels. The results may surprise you.
Login To Leave Comment