p. 133 | SAVED BY FAMILIES by S. M. I. H.

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Feb 27, 1900

SAVED BY FAMILIES.

By S. M. I. H.

A PROPER adjustment of the relation between parent and child is necessary to harmony in home, church, school, and national life.

I am aware that when I speak of national life, most of my readers will think, if not say, “But what have we to do with national life?” to which I answer that we have much every way to do with the cultivation of those habits of thought and action that would make a harmonious national life if they had an opportunity to express themselves, and that will produce such a condition in the new order of things toward which the Israel of God are being led.

The spirit of contention between the child and either parent will be the seed out of which a harvest of war may be reaped as fruitful in death as the range of personal influence can extend.

“Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right;” and, “Fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord,” are the two arms and hands of the same obligation, which, properly regarded, will make the beauty of the Lord a reality in the most commonplace home, whence, like a pot of mignonette on some humble window-sill, it will breathe out fragrance for every passing breeze to carry far and wide all summer long; or, disregarded, send forth an influence that, like miasma from a slum gutter, may infect a whole city with pestilence.

This commandment to fathers is just as binding as the one which says, “Thou shalt not kill.” Killing by engines of war, or by the assassin’s knife, is the bitter end of the contentious tempers begun in childhood; and the father who provokes his children to wrath is guilty, upon the same principle as the instigator of a crime is guilty (although he may have been a thousand miles from the scene of depredation), and is personally responsible for whatever of evil in motive or act may result from either.

It is no trifling thing to take a child ruthlessly by the shoulder, and shake and push him all about the room, his fists meanwhile flying like a prize fighter’s in his efforts to defend himself. It is a serious business to slap a child on the head, and send him sprawling; all of which I myself have seen on camp-grounds even this summer, while wave on wave of light and power from the Spirit of God was beating in steady tides against every tent door. These things have been done in the presence of a family of children by parents professing a truth that is especially charged with all gifts and graces, filled with the sweetness of the Spirit, and should, with that law that is love, and the love that is law, bring order and harmony into the home.

As long as such contention can go on in the name of home discipline, without such open reproof as shall vindicate the true principles of government and obedience in the sight of the growing children, and set the relation of parent and child in its true Scriptural light, no one need wonder if insubordination and infidelity come like a scourge upon our youth.

Not only so, but there is a species of interference in the name of the truth, between parents and children of other churches, which reacts to the disadvantage of law and order in our own homes.

It is dangerous to your own home for you to seek to influence any other child to disregard the binding nature of the fifth commandment, even if he should be so unfortunate as to have an unbelieving and irresponsible parent, who opposes him in trying to follow the convictions of the Spirit.

If such a child is thrust out of his home, then a blessing will fall upon any that will open to take him in; but for any reason to seek to break him off from the family tree upon which he grew by the order of heaven, will surely bring a curse.

“Hands off,” and “Have faith in God,” would be a good watchword in many cases of which I have become cognizant. The commandment, “Honor thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee,” is just as binding as the one to “remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy;” and any neighbor, friend, evangelist, or minister who would so teach as to lead or encourage any child to even attend a meeting in defiance of his father’s prohibition, takes upon himself the responsibility of the broken law of God. To violate one plain command in the name of another is to “walk in the way of the commandments” like a man with his legs so twisted that he can not help treading on his own feet.

At one of our camp-meetings I met this monstrosity in Christian work. A sixteen-year-old girl had been converted through the labors of some of our tent workers. Her parents were connected with one of the other churches. At first they opposed her, but seeing that she really was conscientious in her efforts to keep the Sabbath, they agreed to leave her free to follow her convictions, making, however, the requirement that she should not go to evening meetings; for they did not think it safe for a girl of her age to go alone, nor wise to have her out after nightfall with persons about whom they knew nothing.

Then some of our brethren took this girl in hand, and so taught her that she thought she must rebel against this law of her home in order to obey God. She reasoned that since these brethren were right about the Sabbath, they must be right in this other matter; and, led by what she supposed to be a conviction of duty, for the first time in her life she defied her father, and went to the night services, often in company with boys and girls of her own age.

Her parents were not only alarmed, but enraged, as matters went from bad to worse; and yet they felt that they must be careful in every move, since all that was precious in life for them was at stake. So they kept quiet, feeling that for a time they could do nothing but stand and look helplessly on while, as it seemed to them, that little company of Seventh-day Adventists, for some strange reason, persisted in trying to ruin their only child.

S. M. I. H.

(To be continued.)