#46. Some Basic Features of Teaching Obedience

06/07/22 • 15 min

Light Duties

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

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

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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/#

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#47. Taught to Obey, By Whom?

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.