Light Duties

Once we're persuaded that it is good for us to train our children in obedience, a new set of potholes form in the road, some deeper than others.

There are many ways we get things wrong. Our sin mangles and makes further obedience more complicated. But the complications don't nullify the command. The exceptions don't change what God has made plain for all of us. The fact that there are potholes don't mean we should give up on the road. It just means being alert, swerving, repairing, and occasionally dealing with the erosion that is undermining the road.

Teaching children to obey is a delicate, yet robust work. No relationship other than parent to child is designed to bear the weight of it. The trained childcare worker, the babysitter, the neighbour, the aunt, the uncle, the grandparent, the friends, the Sunday School teacher, the pastor, the school are not authorised by God to discipline and instruct children into mature godliness. Biblically, no one else is commissioned for this role. Even though other people are involved in the lives of our children, it is—by far—the parents' responsibility to teach their children to obey Jesus.

Other people provide relational backdrop, and short-order support of various kinds, but Scripture directs children to obey their own parents and directs parents to the training and instruction of their own children*. When we notice that the training is not merely a transfer of information and skills, but to "bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord" (Ephesians 6:4), we soon realise that no one else can do it for us.

So, how do we actually teach children to obey? Here's a bullet point list to start with.

This chat is about what has been helpful in different stages of my mothering years, as far as personal Bible reading goes. Resources I mention in the chat can be found on the webpage.

https://biblereading.christkirk.com/women/#

Like me, were you ever the person at school who hated every subject you weren't intuitively good at? The need to save face meant avoiding the areas where one's incompetence could be exposed. Which meant it took me decades to realise there is more to enjoying something than being the best at it. It's possible to learn to do new things. There's much pleasure, when we're willing to be seen for the duffers we are, while we fumble around learning something new.

It's natural to dislike the word 'obedience', after all, none of us are very good at it...

A casual chat about both maternal boredom and bored kids. Is boredom really good for us? I used to think so. It's taken 17 years of being a mum to think otherwise. And, what can we do about it?

https://www.motherbiblelife.com/articles/whymotherhoodisboring

Bringing about belief in Jesus is God's, hidden, sovereign work. On the other hand, tending to behaviour (which can either help or hinder belief) is definitely on the rather visible parental job description. God starts and finishes the work of saving people, but he uses all manner of means in the middle. Christian parents are not meant to wait on belief before we get busy teaching our children to obey Jesus.

Should we expect children will learn to obey when we know they have a sinful nature? Is it even possible this side of Genesis 3?

The fallen, sinful nature does not completely erase the divine likeness every human being bears. If our thinking about total depravity has us conclude that no child can ever learn to obey at all, that they are beyond instruction and correction, that their lack of obedience is inevitably permanent, that they are unrestrainable, then we've not understood enough of the doctrine...

What if kids learning to obey parents is a gift of God's common grace, whether people are Christian or not?

When it comes to fulfilling the great commission in our families (to teach our children to obey Jesus), sometimes our Christian conundrums paralyse us:

• Should we expect children will learn to obey when we know they have a sinful nature? Is it even possible this side of Genesis 3?

• Should we expect obedience (and give consequences for disobedience) when the Bible tells us that "no one is righteous, not even one"?

• Will teaching obedience to Jesus leave kids thinking they merit God's favour by their own goodness?

• Will training our children to obey Jesus make them think they don't need God's forgiveness?

• When I've told my child to put her bowl in the sink, and she doesn't, am I correcting a very young Christian or a very young unbeliever? Does it make any difference?

• When I pray with my child, should I expect she will learn to pray with me, or just listen in? Is it wrong to teach my children to pray when I don't know if they are actually Christians? Does God welcome their prayers? Is it teaching them to be presumptuous?

• Should we teach kids to say sorry to others and God before they understand the significance of what they're doing? Isn't this teaching them formulaic hypocrisy?

• Will teaching obedience make Christianity distasteful to them, leading to rebellion against Jesus down the track?

• Isn't obedience the same as legalism—the thing which undermines the gospel of grace?

• Isn't our job just to teach the Bible, then kids will work out obedience for themselves eventually?

• Doesn't behaviour follow belief? How can children behave a certain way if they don't believe, or are not yet cognitively able to understand the ideas which Christian belief is made from? If our children haven't come to the place of independent belief, how is it possible for them to obey Jesus?

• If it is only God's work which can change our child's heart, what could parents possibly do to help their children obey?

• Since we're saved by grace, why should we care about teaching our children to obey?

This is another audio-only free think about some aspects of teaching kids obedience, shared casually over my kitchen sink. These think-aloud chats are a bit of a birds-eye view from 17 years of parenting six kids (ie. lots of years not being able to ignore the realities of obedience!).

You can find the long train of thought (mostly in article form, all available in audio) at Light Duties.