p. 109 | Training Children by J. HARE

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 19, 1872

Training Children.

By J. HARE

Family government lies at the foundation of all government. The family arrangement is of God, who ordained it in wisdom. The family, therefore, becomes the first school in which the infant mind is shaped; the nursery, or school in which is received the indelible stamp which shapes their characters through life. “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.” Prov. 22: 6

The responsibilities of the parent should be well considered by every individual before entering upon them. That the parent will be held accountable, in a great measure, for the character of his child, is evident from the nature of the relation, as well as from the Scriptures. The destiny of the child depends mainly upon the training which it receives from the parent. As clay in the hands of the potter, so are the children given into the hands of the parent to be molded. The Lord commended Abraham on this point. He says, Gen. 18: 19: “For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment.” The following texts may be examined with profit: Eph. 6: 4; Prov. 13: 24; 12: 18; 23: 13, 14; 22: 15; 29: 15; Deut. 6: 7–20.

Eli’s house furnishes an example of how the Lord looks upon the responsibility of the parent. 1 Sam. 3: 11: “And the Lord said to Samuel, Behold I will do a thing in Israel, at which both the ears of every one that heareth it shall tingle. In that day I will perform against Eli all things which I have spoken concerning his house; when I begin I will also make an end. For I have told him that I would judge his house forever for the iniquity which he knoweth; because his sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not. And therefore I have sworn unto the house of Eli, that the iniquity of Eli’s house shall not be purged with sacrifice nor offering forever.”

The fourth chapter gives the fulfillment of the foregoing predictions. And is the Lord the same yesterday, to-day, and forever? Will he judge the Eli’s of this nation as he did Eli of old? Even among the priests of the present time, we might count scores whose sons have made themselves vile, and their fathers restrained them not.

This is a peculiar age for slackness in family government, and the sad effects are witnessed throughout the length and breadth of society. Our poor-houses, jails, penitentiaries, and lunatic asylums, are being filled because the children have made themselves vile and their fathers restrained them not. Crime of every kind is sadly on the increase. The god of lust and appetite is bowed down to, and worshiped, more or less, by all classes; but especially are the young being taken by the devil at his will.

Fashion, the mightiest among the false gods, is wielding her scepter, and nations are bowing to it. Fashionable gambling, fashionable horse-racing, fashionable drinking, fashionable tobacco-chewing and smoking, and fashionable lying, swindling, and deceiving, in all the arts of trade, fashionable patent-right vending, nineteenth-twentieths of which is a swindle, and other vices and sins too numerous to mention, are becoming fashionable, and hence are indulged in by popular religionists of the present time. And we believe the whole catalogue of crimes may be mainly traced to defects in early training. It is because the children have made themselves vile, and the parents restrained them not.

The faithful student of prophecy will scarcely fail to see in the present fulfillment of 2 Tim. 3, a fearful sign of the approaching end. While it is painful to witness this state of things among the masses, both professors and non-professors, it is equally so to witness the defects in family training among Sabbath-keepers, who have come out under the solemn call of the third angel, and have taken their stand on holy ground, expecting soon the returning of their Lord to destroy the wicked and redeem the righteous. Surely, such should have a higher standard for the training of children, than any that have preceded us in the world’s history. But instead of this, we fall sadly below even our grandfathers. Instead of being influenced by the world and popular religionists around us, we should be a pattern for them, training up our children in the fear and admonition of the Lord.

The great tendency of the present age is to infidelity, spiritualism, and many false isms, all of which is the legitimate result of a careless indifference in training the youth. The seeds of truth have not been carefully planted and cultivated, and nurtured in the young heart. The whole Sunday-school system of the present time is better calculated to make infidels than true followers of the meek and lowly Lamb of God. Pride, fashion, and display are kept before the young mind; festivals, celebrations, and exhibitions, are the main incentives; while Christ is only brought in secondarily. Thousands are thus trained in Sunday-schools from week to week, with the Bible in their hands as a familiar book, while, at the same time, they see their ministers, teachers, and parents, living in almost total disregard of the divine teaching, and spirit of the book. One of two conclusions must necessarily follow: Either that their teachers do not believe it themselves, or that it does not mean what it says.

If we wish to make infidels of our children, we could not pursue a more successful course than to teach and profess the solemn truths of the Bible, and disregard them in our practice. We shall succeed just so far as works are more potent than words.

Parental control is sadly wanting among all classes of society at the present time. There are many fathers and mothers who have but little control over their children. Perhaps the difficulty, in many cases, reaches back to their own training. Having never been properly trained themselves, they are but poorly prepared to train their own offspring. Children should be taken in hand when very young. Just as soon as they manifest self-will, just so soon should that self-will be controlled. Their antics must be noticed by all the family, and every visitor must notice them, and lavish their praises upon them. Thus their vanity is strengthened from the start. I have seen children two or three years old want something. Perhaps the mother could not wait on the child at the moment, when it would fall flat upon the floor, kick, scream, and perhaps hold its breath till it would turn black in the face; and if one such fit did not bring the mother, another would, when the mother would lift it from the floor, call it her little darling, gratify its whims and perhaps hire it to hush crying by giving it candy or something of the kind. All such children govern their mothers instead of their mothers governing them.

Many times in meeting, the whole congregation is disturbed by the running of children back and forth across the church. And I have seen some instances where the parents themselves would seem delighted to have the attention of the people called to them. Such things are exceedingly trying to the faithful minister who finds it necessary to stop in the midst of his subject and call the attention of the parents to their children. Such things are disgusting to all well-bred persons, as well as a palpable violation of the sanctity of the house of God. Children should never be taken into a worshiping assembly, unless they are completely under the control of those having them in charge, and should be kept quiet during service.

Reverence is lamentably wanting among all classes, and especially among the young. Children speak of old persons as though they were far beneath them, and frequently use some nickname in disrespect to those spoken of. Defective training lies at the foundation of this course. If children are properly governed the first three years of their life, their management will be comparatively easy afterwards. The moral standard should ever be kept before them. They should be carefully guarded against the evil, and encouraged in the right. Many have given evidence of saving faith in early youth; but much depends upon constant and faithful training with regard to this. Thousands will be lost in the great day, who might have been saved, if the parents had done their duty by them.

The Catholic church owes its success to the early training of their children. And shall Seventh-day Adventists be less zealous with regard to their children than Catholics? Brethren and sisters, let us, as parents, wake up to the weighty responsibilities resting upon us in this respect. Be assured God will hold us accountable for the influence we exert. Train up the children in the way they should go, and they will not depart from it. But if they make themselves vile, and we restrain them not, remember Eli’s house. J. HARE.