Tuesday, May 25

Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord. – Ephesians 6:4

As a father, I sometimes wish the command had been “Children, don’t exasperate your fathers”, but that isn’t the way it is. The command for children to obey their parents is balanced here with a command to fathers – and mothers, since the word used can apply to both parents. Paul was writing to people living in a patriarchal society in which the father held absolute authority in the home, but the Bible teaches that raising children is to be a joint effort between both mother and father (and of course mothers can be just as exasperating to children as fathers).

Nevertheless, the importance of fathers in the lives of children really cannot be overstated. Many children grow up without a Father in the home, or in their life at all. Author Donald Miller’s book, To Own A Dragon speaks directly to this tragic reality. In the back of the book he lists some horrifying statistics, among them “85% of all children who show behavior disorders come from fatherless homes.”

Fathers and mothers alike have to be careful not to discipline their children out of anger or frustration, which only teaches them to handle their own problems with anger. Instead, treating them as individuals made in the image of God and having their independent relationship to God will help us take them by the hand and lead them where they were meant to go. Proverbs 22:6 says, Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it. The challenge is to distinguish between the way we wish they would go and the way their heavenly Father has designed them to go. But it is a challenge all parents must face. The simple truth is that parenting is hard - really hard. Every parent knows the feelings of anxiety, fear, and general inadequacy that accompany our efforts to raise our kids “right”.

Every parent knows that there is no “one size fits all” approach to parenting; there is no such thing as a magical parenting formula that works for every child. Of course there are certain things that every child needs - things like security, encouragement, discipline, guidance, etc. But when and how to discipline, or when and how to encourage - these are tough questions for parents. When you combine this with the different personalities and temperaments of each child and then with their different developmental stages, you realize that parenting is much more like solving a riddle than following an instruction manual. This is why I am always a little leery of books or seminars that make promises like 10 steps or seven principles of perfecting parenting.

Raising kids in the training and instruction of the Lord takes wisdom, discernment, courage, perseverance and grace (and a whole lot of prayer). But isn’t this precisely the way our Heavenly Father handles us? God does not treat us all with some cookie cutter approach to our spiritual growth, and we should all be very glad that He doesn’t. His Spirit convicts, comforts, challenges, teaches, heals, prompts, and guides in different ways and at different times for different people. Your Father knows when you need to be comforted and He knows when you need to be kicked in your spiritual rear-end. Remember, we are his children and He is fathering us as His children, His dearly loved children (Eph. 5:1).

If you are a parent, take a few moments to thank God for the amazing gift of your children…

Ask Him to give you His insight as your heavenly Father, to know the way each of your children should go, and for the wisdom and courage to train and instruct them in it…

Thank God that He knows you and He designed the way in which you are to go. Thank Him that He is perfectly willing and able to train and instruct you in it.

Prayer:
Father, we praise you for the blessing of children, grant us the joy of taking them by the hand as they grow in their understanding and love of you, and teach us all to know that we too are children with you as our Father – Amen.

Jeff Frazier