What God Tells Parents To Expect

By Nate Wilson for Christ the Redeemer Church, Manhattan, KS, 14 Nov. 2021

Intro

• When I was 20 years old and getting married, I had grown up in a good church and had gotten all my education in good Christian schools, and my conclusion from observing thousands of Christian families, was that most kids from Christian families were not serious about their faith. It appeared to me that it was somewhat unpredictable whether a kid from a Christian family would grow up to love Jesus or love the world.

• So when I got married, I was afraid to have children, because I didn’t want to engage in the gamble of bringing into the world more human beings who might just be more lukewarm Christians, or worse, more fodder for hell. I told my wife, “Let’s just start with one child and see how it goes. I don’t think I could raise any more than three kids.” How ever did I end up with 12 kids???

• Three things changed my perspective on parenting:

1. The first was a book entitled The Way Home, written by Mary Pride, a feminist who had converted to Biblical Christianity in the Presbyterian Church in America. The year I got married, a fellow college student who was also married but had a couple of children gave me a copy of this book after I asked him if the rumor was true that he wasn’t trying to control how many children they would have. Chapter 8 of that book was entitled, “Beyond No-Fault Childrearing,” and it exposed me for the first time to a Biblical basis for welcoming children and expecting God to make them turn out well.

2. The second influence that changed my perspective on parenting was a set of cassette tapes from my brother and sister-in-law, presented to me shortly after the birth of my second child. (For those of you born fewer than 20 years ago, cassette tapes were the way everybody stored information before the digital age. An electromagnet was used to arrange rust particles on a long piece of plastic tape into waves the same shape as sound waves, then the tape would be wrapped around a spool for storage. To play the tape back, you’d put it in a tape player with a motor that turned the spool and dragged the tape across a magnetically-sensitive head that would turn the waves of charged rust particles back into sound waves with a loudspeaker. The cool thing was you actually possessed this recording and could listen to it anywhere, any time, without any internet connection, and you could physically hand it to someone else and then they could listen to it!) Anyway, these tapes from my brother were of a seminar delivered by an ex-hippie-turned-conservative-Mennonite named Denny Kenaston. Among other things, he preached passionately on training and disciplining children. He was definitely not Presbyterian, but he had a confidence I had never heard before in a preacher, that children raised intentionally and diligently by Christian parents with Biblical nurture and admonition, would grow up to be godly adults.

3. The third piece that aided in this revolution in my thinking was reading No Greater Joy magazines written by Mike and Debbie Pearl. In their monthly or quarterly articles, they translated their mindset of optimistic Christian parenting into practical examples from everyday living. Now, Mike is an independent fundamental Baptist preacher; he’s as as anti-Calvinist and anti-baby-sprinkling and anti-anything-but-King-James-Bible as you can get, so I have my theological disagreements with him, but his belief that parents fundamentally shape the character of their children was pretty convincing as, over the years, every one of his children have grown up and gotten married and carried on the faith.

• What I would like to do this morning is share with you some of the principles from Scripture that convinced me that raising children is not an exercise in random chance, but rather that God has told us in His word to expect certain results from certain parenting actions.

• Now, as I do this, I am painfully aware of the fact that most of the Christian families I have known got a mixed bag of results from their parenting, some black sheep and some good kids, some that turn out to be missionaries and some that show up for church only on Christmas and Easter. And, while it may be tempting for some of us idealistic zealots and black-and-white thinkers to cavalierly condemn all those parents and assume they all did something wrong, that is not where I’m going.

• I am aware of the philosophical tension between the sovereignty of God and the reality of human will, and I know that the proverbs in the Bible general describe trends in which there can be exceptions. What I’m trying to do is to see, “What does the Bible teach us to hope for? What expectations does God’s word set for us?” and then offer hope to young parents who are starting out in the great ministry of parenting children.

• So what does the Bible tell us to expect as normative in child-rearing?

Ever since Adam and Eve did the one thing God commanded them not to do in the Garden of Eden, they and their descendants have been broken in their rela­tionship with God, making rebellion against God the natural state of their flesh.

• David, who said that he was “sinful from conception” (Psalm 51:5) and that the wicked are “liars” from the day they are “born” (Psalm 58:3) wrote in Psalm 14:3 “As for Yahweh, from the heavens He looked down over the descendants of Adam to see: Is there an insightful man, one who seeks God? The entirety has turned away, together they have become tainted, there is not one who does good – there is not even one!” (NAW)

• The Apostle Paul states it succinctly in Ephesians 2:3 “...we all ... were by nature children of wrath…” By nature, and he briefly states the consequence in 1 Cor. 15:22 “...in Adam all die...”

• He elaborated in Romans 5:12-19 “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned... by the one man's offense [still speaking of Adam] many died... the judgment which came from one offense resulted in condemnation... by the one man's offense death reigned through the one... through one man's offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation... by one man's disobedience many were made sinners... 7:18-23 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice… I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members... 8:7-8 the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.” (NKJV)

• This is what God tells us to expect of human nature left to itself. Don’t expect anything good, and do expect death.

Is there any hope then? What keeps us from despairing and dying?

• Well, when I read Romans 5, I skipped some very important phrases. Let me re-insert them into the text: “But the free gift is not like the offense. For if by the one man's offense many died [speaking of Adam and the natural state of humanity], much more the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abounded to many. And the gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned. For the judgment which came from one offense resulted in condemnation, but the free gift which came from many offenses resulted in justification. For if by the one man's offense death reigned through the one [Adam], much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.) Therefore, as through one man's offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man's righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life. For as by one man's [Adam’s] disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's [Jesus’] obedience many will be made righteous. Moreover the law entered that the offense might abound. But where sin abounded, grace abounded much more, so that as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” (Romans 5:15-21, NKJV) The grace of God which justifies offenders, as a free gift paid for by the death of Jesus on the cross, and which transforms sinners, who have been condemned to death, into kings who are alive and right, is fantastic news!

• Ephesians 2:1-10 “And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others. But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” (NKJV)

I want to make the case that both the problem of original sin and the hope of addressing it are not only applied to adults but also to children.

• Proverbs 29:15 says¹שֵׁבֶט וְתוֹכַחַת יִתֵּן חָכְמָה וְנַעַר מְשֻׁלָּח מֵבִישׁ אִמּוֹ׃
  KJV The rod and reproof give wisdom: but a child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame.
  NAS The rod and reproof give wisdom, But a child who gets his own way brings shame to his mother.
  NIV A rod and a reprimand impart wisdom, but a child left undisciplined disgraces its mother.

  • The Hebrew word here describing the kind of child who brings shame to his mother is meshullack which simply means “to send.”

  • The passive Pual spelling of this verb here is translated “sent” in 7 out of the 11 places it occurs in the Old Testament², and in the other 4 places, it is translated (depending on what version you’re reading): “cast/thrown/thrust” (Job 18:8); “scattered/pushed from” (Isa. 16:2), “forsaken/forlorn/abandoned/exiled” (Isa. 27:10); “put away/sent away” (Isa. 50:1).

  • The Bible tells us what to expect if we “push away” our children and “leave” them to themselves, and that is “shame.”

  • Parents who leave their child to wander on their own will train up their child to walk in the way that seems right to the child³, and will discover that the natural inclinations of that child are not good, and shame will be the result.

  • On the other hand, parents who intervene wisely in their children’s lives, using appropriate physical discipline with the rod and using appropriate words of correction and reproof to confront actions and attitudes in their children which violate God’s commands, will experience the short-term frustrations of conflict, but in the long-term their children will have wisdom.

  • Let’s look at one other Proverb on this topic of whether original sin applies to children:

• Proverbs 22:15 אִוֶּלֶת קְשׁוּרָה בְלֶב־נָעַר שֵׁבֶט מוּסָר יַרְחִיקֶנָּה מִמֶּנּוּ׃
  NAW Foolishness comes tied onto the heart of a child; the rod of discipline will cause it to be far from him.⁴

  • In other places, the noun translated “discipline/correction” is the word for “bonds/ shackles⁵,” so it is a choice between two masters, the master of foolishness or the master of wisdom. Both wisdom and foolishness bring boundaries to a child, but the boundaries imposed by wisdom result in happiness, contentment, productivity, and fruitfulness in God’s kingdom, whereas the kind of boundaries resulting from foolishness are things like handcuffs, prison bars, addictions, and restrictions.

  • The point is that children come to us with folly already attached to their hearts. As the NAS, NIV, and ESV read, it is “bound up in the heart of a child.” It is the calling of Christ­ian parents to challenge that folly rather than leave it alone, to “drive it far away from him” by appropriate processes of verbal and physical disciplines which train him to resist folly.

  • (“The rod of correction” by the way, is not punishment to atone for his or her folly; only the cross of Christ can pay for your child’s folly. The rod is one of the two Biblical training methods to help your child learn that resisting sin and choosing what is wise is in his best interest. The other Biblical training method is positive instruction in the wisdom of God’s word.)

• So the basic problem that all children and all parents have is this struggle with a sin nature which naturally comes with being born from human parents. This means that, while there are basic social and academic skills we can impart to them by various methods of training, the most fundamental problem of brokenness in a child’s innermost being can only be resolved by addressing their spiritual relationship with God, training them to ask Jesus to forgive them of their sins and make them right, training them to turn away from evil, training them to choose what God says is good, and training them to follow your own example of loving God with all your heart, mind, and strength.

• But the questions remain, “Is that what God actually says for parents to do? And what does the Bible say we can expect from doing that?”

Discipline & Instruction are the two main strategies God gives us for parenting.

• Proverbs 13:24 ⁶חוֹשֵׂךְ שִׁבְטוֹ שׂוֹנֵא בְנוֹ וְאֹהֲבוֹ שִׁחֲרוֹ מוּסָר׃
  NKJ He who spares his rod hates his son, But he who loves him disciplines him promptly.
  NAU He who withholds his rod hates his son, But he who loves him disciplines him diligently.
  NIV ... is careful to discipline… KJV ...chasteneth him betimes.

  • Using a “rod” – that is, some kind of stick designed to bring stinging pain but not actual damage to the skin or internal organs – as a training discipline is what the Bible prescribes for a loving parent. This is your physical tool which God has given to you to use.

  • “Holding back” on this kind of intervention, “refraining” from it is actually mean to your children!

  • Notice that your use of this tool is not to take out anger and hatred against your child, it is a tool to express love toward the child. A parent who loves their child wants the best for them and will do what it takes to train their child through physical discomfort to avoid things that will harm them. But there is a second tool that is just as important:

• Deuteronomy 6:6-7 “And these words, which I command you today, shall be upon your heart, and you shall sharpen them for your children, and you shall talk with them when you sit in your house, and when you travel on the road, and when you lie down, and when you get up.” (NAW)

  • Here’s the other tool: instruction using the words of God spoken to your children in your home when they go to bed, when they get up, when they sit down for meals, and outside the home while you’re driving places.

  • And not just “taught,” but “taught diligently,” as the KJV put it. This Hebrew word שנן is a special verb that only occurs 8 other times in the Old Testament, and in all but one of them it is translated “whet” or “sharpen⁷;” and in that one, it is translated “pricked/vexed/ pierced.”

    • A lazy bowhunter won’t go to the trouble to keep his arrows sharp, he’ll just shoot and hope something sticks, but it usually won’t. So it is with a lazy teacher who doesn’t take the time to refine his or her points and illustrate them well to bring understanding and apply them specifically to bring about change.

    • The NIV renders Deuteronomy 6:7 as “Impress them on your children,”

    • and the NLT “Repeat them again and again to your children.”

    • God tells parents – especially fathers – to go to that extra effort to “sharpen” your teaching methods so that your children understand the Bible. (And that instruction is not just “do’s and dont’s;” we are to instruct them in the character of God and the way of salvation too!)

• In the New Testament summary on parenting instructions in Ephesians 6:4, these two strategies are called “nurture and admonition” or “discipline and instruction.” “Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” (ESV)

• These are the two basic interventions which God commands parents to make in their children’s lives: physical correction and verbal instruction.

  • God’s word tells parents that we can expect our children naturally to do shameful things and die young and go to hell without those parental interventions. (Of course, in God’s grace, there are exceptions, but I’m talking about the norm that God, in the Bible, has taught us to expect.)

  • Biblical parenting, however, is to confront the natural state of folly in children with both disciplinary training (not to do what is against God’s will) and instructional training (in doing what is God’s will).

  • But what expectations does God give to parents who intervene with such Biblical discipline and instruction?

Promises from Scripture

• Deuteronomy 5:29 “...fear Me and always keep all My commandments, that it might be well with them and with their children forever!” (NKJV)

  • What does the Law say we should expect of the children of parents who respect and obey God? “It will be well with them!”

• Psalm 112:1-2 “...Blessed is the man who fears the LORD, Who delights greatly in His command­ments. His descendants will be mighty on earth; The generation of the upright will be blessed.” (NKJV)

  • What do the Psalms say that we should expect of the children of parents who fear the LORD and love the Bible? Their children “will be blessed”!

• Proverbs 19:18 “Chasten your son while there is hope, And do not set your heart on his destruction.” ... 23:13-14 “Do not withhold correction from a child, For if you beat him with a rod, he will not die. You shall beat him with a rod, And deliver his soul from hell.” … 29:17 “Correct your son, and he will give you rest; Yes, he will give delight to your soul.” (NKJV)

  • You see, there IS hope; God’s word says there is hope. Parenting is not a 50/50 chance.

  • Using the rod of discipline appropriately as a training tool can deliver a child’s soul from hell. That’s not my words; that’s what the Bible actually says. God’s word encourages us up to have real hope for our children when we parent according to His will!

  • You want to have delightful children? Correct them with discipline and instruction!

• Proverbs 31:26-28 “She opens her mouth with wisdom, And on her tongue is the law of kindness. She watches over the ways of her household, And does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children rise up and call her blessed…”

  • What kind of parent is this woman? She is diligent and careful with her household, and God’s word is always coming out of her lips. The Bible says we should expect her children to grow up with such a relationship with their Mama’s God that they can speak blessings upon her.

  • So far the Law and the Psalms and the Wisdom literature. What about the Prophets?

• Malachi 2:14-15 “...the LORD has been witness Between you and the wife of your youth... your wife by covenant. But did He not make them one, Having a remnant of the Spirit? And why one? He seeks godly offspring.” (NKJV)

  • Why does God bring a godly man and a godly woman together in marriage? The Bible says “because He seeks godly offspring.” Wait, how can He be so presumptuous as to call the offspring “godly” before children are even born? It’s because that is God’s design from the beginning.

  • Is it any wonder, then, that Jesus taught the same principle in the gospels?

• Luke 18:15-16 They also brought infants to Him that He might touch them; but when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them. But Jesus called them to Him and said, "Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of God.” (NKJV) And He laid His hands on them and blessed them.

  • Do you think Jesus would have spoken blessings over those children if He expected some of them to go to hell? Why would He think that these children should be blessed?

  • I suggest it is because He knew that every one of their parents had such faith in Him that they had carried their children to Him to be blessed. That kind of parenting which brings children into the presence of Christ is the very kind of parenting He blesses!

  • The same inference can be made from the Apostolic writings:

• Titus 1:5-6 “This is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remained into order, and appoint elders in every town as I directed you—if anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife, and his children are believers and not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination.”

  • The Greek word πιστος describing the children of an elder candidate is sometimes translated “trustworthy,” and sometimes it is translated “believer” (as in a Christian), but it is generally agreed that the latter is meant here.

  • But that indicates there is some connection between a man’s faith and the faith of his children. How could God set such a standard if it were a matter of mere chance whether a man’s children became believers?

• Matthew 18:2-6 “Then Jesus summoned a child and stood it in the midst of them, and He said, ‘Really, I'm telling y'all, unless your [direction] happens to be turned and y'all become like the children, you shall never enter into the kingdom of the heavens. Therefore, whichever one [of you] will humble himself like this child, it is this man who is the greater one in the kingdom of the heavens, and whoever shall receive this child on the basis of my name is receiving me myself! But whoever shall scandalize one of these little ones who believe in me, it bears together for him that a donkey-millstone might be hanged about his neck and that he might be drowned in the deep part of the lake.’” (NAW)

  • Here Jesus is saying that little children can believe in Him and enter the kingdom of God.

  • What wonderful hope this brings to us as parents that as we nourish ourselves from the Bible because we want to feed on God’s word, our children that we bring along with us to family devotion times and to church gatherings can also have faith in Jesus that is all that is needed to enter the kingdom of heaven!

  • In fact, the Apostle Peter went so far as to say that the Holy Spirit was also promised to the children of believers:

• Acts 2:38-39 Peter said, "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call." (NKJV)

  • Where was this promised? The language “to you and to your children and to the foreign­ers” hearkens back to Deuteronomy 29 which promised curses upon the hearers, upon their children and upon their foreign servants for breaking the eternal covenant with God; now Peter is proclaiming the blessings of the eternal covenant through Jesus Christ in the same way to heads of households, their children, and foreigners!

  • Perhaps he is also thinking of the promise of the Holy Spirit in Isaiah 44:3, where God tells the Israelites, “I will pour my Spirit upon your seed, and my blessing upon your offspring.” (NAW)

  • God is not stingy with His blessings. He is not like an insurance company that is trying to end His line of benefits with you, hoping somehow He doesn’t have to share them with your children and grandchildren too. No, He has told us in the Bible over and over that He wants to open the floodgates of heaven and bless your children and grandchildren for a thousand generations if you’ll only cooperate!

  • Isn’t that what He said, in the 10 Commandments? “I am Yahweh your God… showing lovingkindness to thousands [of generations] of those who love Me and keep My commandments.” (Exodus 20:5-6, NAW)

  • If this does not stagger you with hopeful anticipation for the future of your children, I don’t know what will!

• Can you think of any place in the Bible where it says, “Be a good parent because that’s the right thing to do, but there’s no telling how your children will turn out.”? That’s not the message I read from scripture; what I see everywhere is God’s intention for the faith to be passed down from parent to child, and purposeful connections between parents being faithful and their children being blessed.

• But what if you didn’t have godly parents? Is there any hope for you? Absolutely!

  • We see in the books of the prophets that having ungodly parents doesn’t doom godly children to perdition. God treats each generation on their own merits⁸.

  • And we see from the examples of Daniel’s and Nehemiah’s prayers of confession⁹ in the Bible that if the children of ungodly parents confess their sin to God and ask God for His mercy and salvation, God will absolutely answer their prayers for forgiveness and salvation.

• There is hope for everyone – and every parent – who loves Jesus wholeheartedly and does what He says and uses the rod of discipline and the word of God for instruction. Just “abide,” “trust,” and “delight” in the Lord (Jesus) and He will give you “much fruit,” He will “direct your paths,” and He will “give you your heart’s desire.”¹⁰