Discipline is an important part of parenting, but there’s another, positive side to being an effective parent.
David Mathis, writing for the website “Desiring God” says the bible holds important lessons for parents on the way to bring up their children. Here are some of the principles he found….
Nourish Them in Jesus. He points to Ephesians 6:4 that tells us positively to “bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”
He says the task for parents is to nourish our children with what God has revealed to us in the Scriptures about himself, humanity, our sin, our world, and his Son.
The goal is to guide them toward becoming Christian adults.
Encourage Them in Grace. Colossians 3:21 provides a glimpse into how to think about a child’s heart. “Lest they become discouraged” guards against the negative, and points toward the positive pursuit of parenting: that they become encouraged.
Rather than behaving toward our children in such a way that they lose heart, the task is to seek to grow and develop the heart God has given them.
And Working for Our Children’s Joy. Provoking a child to anger and causing her to lose heart is the opposite of the call of Christian parenthood. To say it positively, a parent’s calling is to be the smile of God to our children, gladly spending and being spent for our children’s deepest and most enduring joy.