Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged.
Fathers must not treat their children in ways that stir them to anger and leave them discouraged and crushed in spirit, a duty that though spoken to fathers binds mothers and parents generally. It forbids irritating them with harsh, angry, impatient and unkind words, scolding, threatening, constant fault-finding and unjust censure. It forbids passionate, severe and unreasonable correction by force and blows, and all injustice and inconsistency such as undeserved punishment, broken promises, impulsive management and punishment without a patient hearing. Instead parents must be vigilant and firm yet sympathetic, tender and self-controlled, uniting love with justice and winning the confidence and love of their children by kindness, encouragement and patient guidance. For provoking treatment discourages children until they lose heart and give up trying to do right, hardens and embitters them, wounds affection and influence, and drives them away from parents and from God.
Wording and Scope
The verse lays a charge on fathers not to handle their children in ways that stir them to anger and leave them discouraged, and calls for care and restraint so that parental conduct does not crush their spirits. Harsh and overbearing dealing is forbidden because it weakens children's affection for their father and can drive them away, while correction and guidance are to be given with patience, mercy, tenderness and love. Speaking to annoy children and striking them in anger must be put away because they destroy parental influence, and patience and tenderness are required after the pattern of Christ's concern for children. Harsh, impatient reproof is forbidden because it confirms children in wrong ways and weakens the affection that should bind parents and children. Household discipline is to follow God's word rather than passion or misplaced affection, uniting love with justice, enforcing obedience, and guiding children with patience and firmness, since scolding and constant fault-finding foster a hasty, passionate temper.
Though spoken to fathers, the duty binds mothers as well and teaches parents generally not to irritate or discourage their children. Irritating children with harsh, angry words is forbidden, for even when children are wrong parents cannot lead them to do right by losing patience, while calmness can help restore them to a right frame of mind. The parental duty answers to the child's duty to obey parents in the Lord, and it forbids fretting, scolding, threatening, bursting into passion over anything displeasing, treating children with injustice and in an unreasonable manner, severe undeserved punishment, breaking promises and so weakening confidence, and impulsive, non-uniform management that one day overlooks wrong and the next day shows no patience or self-control. Such provoking discourages children until they think there is no use trying to be good and to do right, makes them stubborn and secretive when they already feel convicted, humiliated and distressed over wrong, injures their souls, bewilders their minds, and forfeits the opportunity to instill right principles. In place of this, patience, kindness and gentleness are required, winning the confidence and love of children so that control becomes easy, mingling kindness, affection and love with government firm as a rock to right principles, diverting minds from wrong into another channel, and when correcting manifesting sorrow and love rather than anger. Failure leaves sin at the door of parents and often makes parents more guilty than their children, since waywardness often comes from mismanagement. Children are sensitive, and harshness or injustice that wounds and discourages them can make them lose heart, refuse to heed commands, and become rebellious, while calm firmness, loving words, and considerate, consistent control avoid this harm.
The command belongs to the holy character God's elect develop to make their calling and election sure. Keeping it helps keep a clear distinction between those who honor God by keeping His commandments and those who disobey Him, lived out in this life with respect to the future reward. It is one of the practical duties belonging to those who have put off the old man with his deeds and put on the new man renewed after the image of Christ, who purify their souls by obeying the truth and begin to live the life of the heavenly order here below in preparation to appear with Christ in glory in the new heaven and new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness.
It is part of the plain instruction in the third chapter of Colossians about what must be done to leave a favorable impression of the truth on the minds of unbelievers. Kept with the rest of the chapter, it calls for perfection of character through a life blended with Christ's life, lived as a Bible Christian striving lawfully for the crown of life.
Forbidden Provocations
The verse forbids irritating children with harsh, angry, impatient, fretful, unkind and hasty words, including scolding, fretting, threatening, loud-voiced commands, constant fault-finding, censuring over trifles, unjust censure, undeserved blame and harsh criticism. Even when children are wrong they cannot be led to do right by loss of patience, while calmness can restore them to a right frame of mind. Scolding, unjust censure, fault-finding, irritability and lack of self-control wound children, drain cheerfulness and ambition, destroy cheerfulness and desire to please, make obedience feel like drudgery, and leave them discouraged and indifferent to winning approval. Such provoking discourages them until they think there is no use trying to be good and to do right.
It forbids passionate, severe, cruel and unreasonable correction, including whipping, beating, striking or shaking in anger, blows, rule by force and an arbitrary display of parental power. Continual censuring and whipping harden children and estrange them from parents, and shaking a child or striking an impatient blow does not subdue wrong but makes conduct worse. Rule by force, blows, impatience or arbitrary power will not win love, but stirs a combative spirit, makes the child more defiant, and strengthens opposition with each repetition. Firm discipline does not require threats, harshness, losing temper, scolding or passionate striking, which harms the parent-child relation and teaches quarrelsome behavior.
It forbids injustice and inconsistency such as treating children unreasonably, severe undeserved punishment, breaking promises and so weakening confidence, and impulsive non-uniform management that one day overlooks wrong and the next shows no patience or self-control. Harsh, angry, vindictive and inconsistent discipline fills a child with anger and destroys love and respect, calling instead for firmness and consistency without passion. It also forbids punishment without hearing the child's explanation, refusing to listen patiently, exposing faults before siblings, and unjust accusations, which humiliate without correcting and can seem cruel and unfair and foster hatred toward the parent.
It forbids governing in an exacting, independent, arbitrary way that permits no liberty of will, dictating over every member as a machine is moved and acting as though only the father is capable of self-government. It likewise forbids being offended when the wife opposes his opinion or questions his decisions, mistaking this for Christian wisdom, when it displeases Heaven, makes children fear without loving, and after long patient waiting drives the wife toward nervousness, distraction, contempt, rebellion and almost desperation while shortening her days. It forbids withholding love and affection, scolding, censoring and tyrannical treatment that turn hearts away and undermine confidence, and requires giving due respect to children as the Lord's heritage rather than treating them with disrespect like dogs to be ordered about, with scolding, beating and passionate roughness.
It forbids dealing without Christlike tenderness by picking at children, constantly wounding them, flinging the Bible at them in harsh denunciations, and speaking to annoy them. Such harsh seed stamps upon them a character inherited from father and mother that will reappear when they head their own families and repeat the same example unless thorough renovation takes place. It forbids indifference to concerns that matter greatly to children, for they are sensitive and easily made unhappy, needing sympathy, gentle discipline, loving words and encouragement to protect their hearts and strengthen trust. It warns against swinging from severity to excessive indulgence, calling instead for vigilance and firmness joined with sympathy and tenderness.
Required Loving Discipline
Discipline must be vigilant and firm yet carried out with sympathy, tenderness, courtesy and self-control, uniting love with justice and holding as firm as a rock to right principles. It must be guided by God's word rather than by passion or misplaced affection, avoiding both severity and excessive indulgence, and it must be calm, considerate, consistent and tender in correction and rebuke, showing children that they are loved and that their good and happiness are sought. Scolding and constant fault-finding are forbidden because they foster a hasty, passionate temper, while patience joined with firmness enforces obedience without acting in passion. Harshness and injustice wound sensitive children and cause them to lose heart, refuse commands and become rebellious, whereas calm firmness, loving words and steady control preserve their courage.
Control becomes easy when the confidence and love of children are won, and this requires speaking kindly and cheerfully, showing affection, encouraging perseverance, strengthening good impulses and actions, and praising efforts to do right. Minds are to be diverted from wrong into another channel, and parents must remember that children struggle against temptation and may fail repeatedly even when they desire to do right. Kind, fair correction with self-control meets their emotional needs, sustains cheerfulness and ambition, and keeps them from becoming discouraged or indifferent to pleasing their parents. Because children are sensitive and less able to bear censure than adults, trifling mistakes must not bring harsh blame, actual wrong and sin are to be addressed firmly, and sympathy with gentle discipline and loving encouragement protects their hearts, gives them courage to improve, regains confidence and approval, and strengthens trust.
When correction is necessary it must be given without anger but with reluctance, sorrow, pity, concern and love, seeking the child's good rather than venting parental displeasure. The parent must first gain self-control, wait for temper to cool and give the child time to think, then take the child aside, clearly explain the wrong and its seriousness as sin against God, and pray before correction so discipline does not become an outlet for anger. Talking with the child, praying with the child, reading the Scriptures, kneeling to ask the Lord for pardon, and using kind words and instruction help the child recognize parental care and turn effort toward what is right. Correction is the time above all times for humility, patience and prayer in order to win the child to Christ by kindness and love, so that a higher power than that of earth cooperates with parental effort. Harsh angry words are not of heavenly origin, never help, and stir up the worst feelings, and continual censuring and whipping harden children and estrange them, while cross words and needless anger do not reform.
Parents must exercise restraining power over thought and word, revealing a converted heart in a subdued voice, wise judgment, and mutual respect between husband and wife, with no word of disrespect about the other spoken in the children's hearing. They must first set an example of patience, gentleness and love, forbidding hasty words, sharpness of voice, anger, hardness of heart, cruelty and unjust punishment, and carrying out sorrow, pity, justice and judgment to fulfill God's purpose in the home. Obedience may be required, but parents must remember they themselves are under God's discipline, and their kindly treatment and reasonable conduct help children grow in love and respect. Children are won by reason and kindness rather than harsh reproof, harsh words or a severe manner, and when duty requires restraint, separation from young company or denial of privileges enjoyed by others, every word and act must be perfectly reasonable to them so reflection is not embittered and influence is not destroyed. In this way children can be prepared to be taken into the fellowship of the church.
Love must be the ruling element in the home, with only kind, patient, loving words heard, creating an influence in which no unkind or impertinent word to father or mother would be ventured. Parents must sympathize with children in joys and trials, gather them to the heart and bind them there by cords of love, and win respect and confidence by being their very best friend who delights to give pleasure rather than laying down too many commands and rules that will surely be forgotten. Consistent example must teach that truth, honor, courage, patience and meekness are fruits of the Christian tree, while scolding, loud-voiced commands, dissension and strife have no part in religion, and justice must be seen with its twin sister love and the peace of Christ abiding in the heart as the ruling element of life. The home must be kept as a home for Christ and a home of prayer marked by sweetness and grace, with the mouth closed against every impatient, fretful, harsh or unkind word that would irritate, discourage, arouse the worst feelings, stir resentment and loss of heart, and drive away God's angels and the Holy Spirit. From that center parents carry on constant work to bring every soul up in nurture and admonition, teaching respect for religious things, the love of God and Christ's sacrifice for eternal life, training the little ones to help, to overcome wrong habits and to turn from tobacco, liquor and sinful practices, correcting offenses by sitting with Scripture and showing consequences, and putting this work before business, wheat or corn so that parents and children may enter together at the gate of the city.
Effects on Children
Provoking children discourages them until cheerfulness, ambition, and desire to please are destroyed and obedience feels like drudgery. They become indifferent to winning approval and lose heart, refusing commands and concluding there is no use trying to be good and do right. Scolding, threatening, unjust censure, undeserved blame, repeated fault-finding, irritability, and lack of self-control wound them and drain their spirits in this way. Children are sensitive, and harshness and injustice make them lose heart rather than heed correction.
Harsh, impatient, and unwise treatment hardens children instead of correcting them. It makes them stubborn and secretive when they already feel convicted, humiliated, and distressed over wrong, confirms them in wrong ways, and makes their conduct worse. Continual censuring, criticism, whipping, shaking, striking in impatience, violence, threats, and passionate severity stir destructive and combative passions that leave a lasting impression and grow stronger each time the same treatment is repeated. Such correction becomes an outlet for parental anger rather than a means of subduing wrong.
It wounds children, bewilders their minds, and injures their souls. Harshness and severity weaken affection, destroy parental influence, and estrange and alienate children from their parents. Unjust accusations, punishment without hearing the child's explanation, refusal to listen patiently, exposing faults before siblings, speaking to annoy, and striking in anger humiliate without correcting and can seem cruel and unfair, fostering hatred, opposition, retaliation, and a combative spirit. A father's harshness and lack of patience can in this way damage his children's faith and contribute to their impenitence.
Such provoking stirs the worst feelings of their nature and arouses opposition and feelings almost of hatred toward parents. It keeps children from loving the Bible and drives them away from parents and from God. A passionate, fretful, impatient, harsh, or unkind word can discourage a child in a moment and drive the angels of God and the Holy Spirit from the home. Treating children roughly, ordering them about without respect, and perpetuating passionate traits is a work that pleases Satan.
The harsh seed sown stamps upon children character inherited from father and mother that will be revealed when they stand at the head of their own families. Unless thorough renovation of character takes place, their domestic life will repeat the same unchristlike example, making them coarse and rough and fitting them to become the same kind of families, so passionate hereditary traits are perpetuated. Losing temper, scolding, or striking passionately also teaches quarrelsome behavior even while claiming to enforce firm discipline. Exacting, independent, arbitrary rule that permits no liberty of will makes children fear without loving, shortens the wife's days, and after her long-suffering and patient waiting drives her to nervousness, distraction, contempt, rebellion against unjust authority, and almost to desperation.
Home Mission and Accountability
The command lays a binding duty of Christian missionary work in the home upon parents, and especially upon fathers as God-fearing educators to raise children in the Lord's way rather than by harshness that breaks their courage. The father stands as house-band of the family and accountable steward of a sacred trust who must command his children and household after him to keep the way of the Lord. He stands also as priest encircling the family and as its binding band to preserve the love of Christ in heart and mind and to bind the children to his own heart, while the mother stands as queen and educator from babyhood, and neither has liberty to indulge impatience at home. The home must be kept as a home for Christ and a home of prayer marked by sweetness and the grace of God, with the mouth held closed against every passionate, fretful, impatient, harsh or unkind word, because such words in a moment arouse the worst feelings, irritate wife and children to resentment and loss of heart, discourage the child, and drive away the angels of God and the Holy Spirit. Because the children have been brought into the world and are God's children, parents have no right to neglect one soul in the house for business or other things, but must carry on a constant work to bring every soul up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. That work teaches respect for religious things and the love of God and that Jesus Christ gave His life that they might have eternal life, trains the little ones to help and to overcome every wrong habit, trains them away from tobacco, liquor and sinful practices that weaken brain nerve strength, brain power and physical strength and bring body, mind and soul under darkness, and corrects offenses by sitting down with Scripture and showing consequences, putting this work before wheat, corn or business so that parents and children are not lost but enter together at the gate of the city of God.
Children are the Lord's heritage and God's property given to parents to save and to educate for heaven, to guard from the evils they will meet, and therefore fathers must give them due respect. They must govern with self-control, patience, courtesy and love rather than with a high hand that shows no respect, and must not treat children like dogs to be ordered about, nor deal with them by scolding, beating, and a passionate, rough manner. Such rule by force, blows, impatience, or arbitrary display of power provokes them to anger and discourages them, makes conduct worse and will not win love, makes them coarse and rough and fits them to become the same kind of families, perpetuating passionate hereditary traits, a work that pleases Satan. The duty binds even those who have overcome appetite for tobacco and liquor and who keep the Sabbath at financial loss, for they still must learn kindness and restraint toward their children. A father must fulfill his duties with care and regard for the effect of his conduct, keeping his example sacred and worthy of respect, and parents must share the responsibility of training and speak no word of disrespect about one another in the children's hearing. Instead they must bring the light of heaven and the converting power of God into the home, be Christlike as Christians, talk to them kindly and tenderly about what it is their privilege to have and what it is their privilege to shun, tell them heaven is watching and waiting to receive them if they will repent and come to God, and not rest until the family is united in faith, for if they fail the blame is their own.
Parents are laborers together with God who form a family firm with their children, and whenever possible parents and children should be kept together under loving parental watchcare as a sacred privilege. Belonging to that firm means parents must patiently and kindly restrain children from evil with mercy, tenderness and intelligent care, letting patience have her perfect work with the different temperaments in the family, and such restraint is a constant school that will make children a blessing to the school. The duty laid on parents matches the duty of children to obey in the Lord and binds mothers as well as fathers. Failure leaves sin at the door of parents and often makes parents more guilty than their children, since waywardness often comes from mismanagement. God takes account of how children are corrected, so correction must be given without anger, harshness, cruelty or unreasonable severity, but with patience, gentleness, sorrow and pity, requiring obedience while remembering that parents themselves are under God's discipline, that their example and kindly treatment may help children grow in love and respect.
Loss of self-command that stirs children to anger and discourages them instead of correcting them comes in large part from eating improperly, whether from bad quality of food or too great a quantity even of good food. Such eating calls nervous energy to the stomach, breaks up circulation, leaves no vitality for self-control, and makes parents fretful and impatient toward their children, unable to reason from cause to effect. In that state they act blindly and violently in their families, shaking a child or striking an impatient blow that does not subdue wrong but makes the child worse and creates more trouble than it cures.
Even when children think they were treated with severity in childhood, cherishing a spirit of retaliation and revenge against parents, especially when they are old and feeble, does not help them grow in grace and in the knowledge of Christ or reflect His image. The very helplessness and necessities of an aged father and sick, old mother plead for love and call forth the noble feelings of the heart. Through the grace of Christ parents are to be treated with kind attention, respect, kindness and love, the sweetest fruits of Christian life, and the heart is not to be made as adamant as steel, for one professing the name of Christ cannot cherish hatred against father and mother.
Fathers must not treat their children in ways that stir them to anger and leave them discouraged and crushed in spirit, a duty that though spoken to fathers binds mothers and parents generally.
It forbids irritating them with harsh, angry, impatient and unkind words, scolding, threatening, constant fault-finding and unjust censure.
It forbids passionate, severe and unreasonable correction by force and blows, and all injustice and inconsistency such as undeserved punishment, broken promises, impulsive management and punishment without a patient hearing.
Instead parents must be vigilant and firm yet sympathetic, tender and self-controlled, uniting love with justice and winning the confidence and love of their children by kindness, encouragement and patient guidance.
For provoking treatment discourages children until they lose heart and give up trying to do right, hardens and embitters them, wounds affection and influence, and drives them away from parents and from God.
Wording and Scope
The verse lays a charge on fathers not to handle their children in ways that stir them to anger and leave them discouraged, and calls for care and restraint so that parental conduct does not crush their spirits. Harsh and overbearing dealing is forbidden because it weakens children's affection for their father and can drive them away, while correction and guidance are to be given with patience, mercy, tenderness and love. Speaking to annoy children and striking them in anger must be put away because they destroy parental influence, and patience and tenderness are required after the pattern of Christ's concern for children. Harsh, impatient reproof is forbidden because it confirms children in wrong ways and weakens the affection that should bind parents and children. Household discipline is to follow God's word rather than passion or misplaced affection, uniting love with justice, enforcing obedience, and guiding children with patience and firmness, since scolding and constant fault-finding foster a hasty, passionate temper.
Though spoken to fathers, the duty binds mothers as well and teaches parents generally not to irritate or discourage their children. Irritating children with harsh, angry words is forbidden, for even when children are wrong parents cannot lead them to do right by losing patience, while calmness can help restore them to a right frame of mind. The parental duty answers to the child's duty to obey parents in the Lord, and it forbids fretting, scolding, threatening, bursting into passion over anything displeasing, treating children with injustice and in an unreasonable manner, severe undeserved punishment, breaking promises and so weakening confidence, and impulsive, non-uniform management that one day overlooks wrong and the next day shows no patience or self-control. Such provoking discourages children until they think there is no use trying to be good and to do right, makes them stubborn and secretive when they already feel convicted, humiliated and distressed over wrong, injures their souls, bewilders their minds, and forfeits the opportunity to instill right principles. In place of this, patience, kindness and gentleness are required, winning the confidence and love of children so that control becomes easy, mingling kindness, affection and love with government firm as a rock to right principles, diverting minds from wrong into another channel, and when correcting manifesting sorrow and love rather than anger. Failure leaves sin at the door of parents and often makes parents more guilty than their children, since waywardness often comes from mismanagement. Children are sensitive, and harshness or injustice that wounds and discourages them can make them lose heart, refuse to heed commands, and become rebellious, while calm firmness, loving words, and considerate, consistent control avoid this harm.
The command belongs to the holy character God's elect develop to make their calling and election sure. Keeping it helps keep a clear distinction between those who honor God by keeping His commandments and those who disobey Him, lived out in this life with respect to the future reward. It is one of the practical duties belonging to those who have put off the old man with his deeds and put on the new man renewed after the image of Christ, who purify their souls by obeying the truth and begin to live the life of the heavenly order here below in preparation to appear with Christ in glory in the new heaven and new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness.
It is part of the plain instruction in the third chapter of Colossians about what must be done to leave a favorable impression of the truth on the minds of unbelievers. Kept with the rest of the chapter, it calls for perfection of character through a life blended with Christ's life, lived as a Bible Christian striving lawfully for the crown of life.
Forbidden Provocations
The verse forbids irritating children with harsh, angry, impatient, fretful, unkind and hasty words, including scolding, fretting, threatening, loud-voiced commands, constant fault-finding, censuring over trifles, unjust censure, undeserved blame and harsh criticism. Even when children are wrong they cannot be led to do right by loss of patience, while calmness can restore them to a right frame of mind. Scolding, unjust censure, fault-finding, irritability and lack of self-control wound children, drain cheerfulness and ambition, destroy cheerfulness and desire to please, make obedience feel like drudgery, and leave them discouraged and indifferent to winning approval. Such provoking discourages them until they think there is no use trying to be good and to do right.
It forbids passionate, severe, cruel and unreasonable correction, including whipping, beating, striking or shaking in anger, blows, rule by force and an arbitrary display of parental power. Continual censuring and whipping harden children and estrange them from parents, and shaking a child or striking an impatient blow does not subdue wrong but makes conduct worse. Rule by force, blows, impatience or arbitrary power will not win love, but stirs a combative spirit, makes the child more defiant, and strengthens opposition with each repetition. Firm discipline does not require threats, harshness, losing temper, scolding or passionate striking, which harms the parent-child relation and teaches quarrelsome behavior.
It forbids injustice and inconsistency such as treating children unreasonably, severe undeserved punishment, breaking promises and so weakening confidence, and impulsive non-uniform management that one day overlooks wrong and the next shows no patience or self-control. Harsh, angry, vindictive and inconsistent discipline fills a child with anger and destroys love and respect, calling instead for firmness and consistency without passion. It also forbids punishment without hearing the child's explanation, refusing to listen patiently, exposing faults before siblings, and unjust accusations, which humiliate without correcting and can seem cruel and unfair and foster hatred toward the parent.
It forbids governing in an exacting, independent, arbitrary way that permits no liberty of will, dictating over every member as a machine is moved and acting as though only the father is capable of self-government. It likewise forbids being offended when the wife opposes his opinion or questions his decisions, mistaking this for Christian wisdom, when it displeases Heaven, makes children fear without loving, and after long patient waiting drives the wife toward nervousness, distraction, contempt, rebellion and almost desperation while shortening her days. It forbids withholding love and affection, scolding, censoring and tyrannical treatment that turn hearts away and undermine confidence, and requires giving due respect to children as the Lord's heritage rather than treating them with disrespect like dogs to be ordered about, with scolding, beating and passionate roughness.
It forbids dealing without Christlike tenderness by picking at children, constantly wounding them, flinging the Bible at them in harsh denunciations, and speaking to annoy them. Such harsh seed stamps upon them a character inherited from father and mother that will reappear when they head their own families and repeat the same example unless thorough renovation takes place. It forbids indifference to concerns that matter greatly to children, for they are sensitive and easily made unhappy, needing sympathy, gentle discipline, loving words and encouragement to protect their hearts and strengthen trust. It warns against swinging from severity to excessive indulgence, calling instead for vigilance and firmness joined with sympathy and tenderness.
Required Loving Discipline
Discipline must be vigilant and firm yet carried out with sympathy, tenderness, courtesy and self-control, uniting love with justice and holding as firm as a rock to right principles. It must be guided by God's word rather than by passion or misplaced affection, avoiding both severity and excessive indulgence, and it must be calm, considerate, consistent and tender in correction and rebuke, showing children that they are loved and that their good and happiness are sought. Scolding and constant fault-finding are forbidden because they foster a hasty, passionate temper, while patience joined with firmness enforces obedience without acting in passion. Harshness and injustice wound sensitive children and cause them to lose heart, refuse commands and become rebellious, whereas calm firmness, loving words and steady control preserve their courage.
Control becomes easy when the confidence and love of children are won, and this requires speaking kindly and cheerfully, showing affection, encouraging perseverance, strengthening good impulses and actions, and praising efforts to do right. Minds are to be diverted from wrong into another channel, and parents must remember that children struggle against temptation and may fail repeatedly even when they desire to do right. Kind, fair correction with self-control meets their emotional needs, sustains cheerfulness and ambition, and keeps them from becoming discouraged or indifferent to pleasing their parents. Because children are sensitive and less able to bear censure than adults, trifling mistakes must not bring harsh blame, actual wrong and sin are to be addressed firmly, and sympathy with gentle discipline and loving encouragement protects their hearts, gives them courage to improve, regains confidence and approval, and strengthens trust.
When correction is necessary it must be given without anger but with reluctance, sorrow, pity, concern and love, seeking the child's good rather than venting parental displeasure. The parent must first gain self-control, wait for temper to cool and give the child time to think, then take the child aside, clearly explain the wrong and its seriousness as sin against God, and pray before correction so discipline does not become an outlet for anger. Talking with the child, praying with the child, reading the Scriptures, kneeling to ask the Lord for pardon, and using kind words and instruction help the child recognize parental care and turn effort toward what is right. Correction is the time above all times for humility, patience and prayer in order to win the child to Christ by kindness and love, so that a higher power than that of earth cooperates with parental effort. Harsh angry words are not of heavenly origin, never help, and stir up the worst feelings, and continual censuring and whipping harden children and estrange them, while cross words and needless anger do not reform.
Parents must exercise restraining power over thought and word, revealing a converted heart in a subdued voice, wise judgment, and mutual respect between husband and wife, with no word of disrespect about the other spoken in the children's hearing. They must first set an example of patience, gentleness and love, forbidding hasty words, sharpness of voice, anger, hardness of heart, cruelty and unjust punishment, and carrying out sorrow, pity, justice and judgment to fulfill God's purpose in the home. Obedience may be required, but parents must remember they themselves are under God's discipline, and their kindly treatment and reasonable conduct help children grow in love and respect. Children are won by reason and kindness rather than harsh reproof, harsh words or a severe manner, and when duty requires restraint, separation from young company or denial of privileges enjoyed by others, every word and act must be perfectly reasonable to them so reflection is not embittered and influence is not destroyed. In this way children can be prepared to be taken into the fellowship of the church.
Love must be the ruling element in the home, with only kind, patient, loving words heard, creating an influence in which no unkind or impertinent word to father or mother would be ventured. Parents must sympathize with children in joys and trials, gather them to the heart and bind them there by cords of love, and win respect and confidence by being their very best friend who delights to give pleasure rather than laying down too many commands and rules that will surely be forgotten. Consistent example must teach that truth, honor, courage, patience and meekness are fruits of the Christian tree, while scolding, loud-voiced commands, dissension and strife have no part in religion, and justice must be seen with its twin sister love and the peace of Christ abiding in the heart as the ruling element of life. The home must be kept as a home for Christ and a home of prayer marked by sweetness and grace, with the mouth closed against every impatient, fretful, harsh or unkind word that would irritate, discourage, arouse the worst feelings, stir resentment and loss of heart, and drive away God's angels and the Holy Spirit. From that center parents carry on constant work to bring every soul up in nurture and admonition, teaching respect for religious things, the love of God and Christ's sacrifice for eternal life, training the little ones to help, to overcome wrong habits and to turn from tobacco, liquor and sinful practices, correcting offenses by sitting with Scripture and showing consequences, and putting this work before business, wheat or corn so that parents and children may enter together at the gate of the city.
Effects on Children
Provoking children discourages them until cheerfulness, ambition, and desire to please are destroyed and obedience feels like drudgery. They become indifferent to winning approval and lose heart, refusing commands and concluding there is no use trying to be good and do right. Scolding, threatening, unjust censure, undeserved blame, repeated fault-finding, irritability, and lack of self-control wound them and drain their spirits in this way. Children are sensitive, and harshness and injustice make them lose heart rather than heed correction.
Harsh, impatient, and unwise treatment hardens children instead of correcting them. It makes them stubborn and secretive when they already feel convicted, humiliated, and distressed over wrong, confirms them in wrong ways, and makes their conduct worse. Continual censuring, criticism, whipping, shaking, striking in impatience, violence, threats, and passionate severity stir destructive and combative passions that leave a lasting impression and grow stronger each time the same treatment is repeated. Such correction becomes an outlet for parental anger rather than a means of subduing wrong.
It wounds children, bewilders their minds, and injures their souls. Harshness and severity weaken affection, destroy parental influence, and estrange and alienate children from their parents. Unjust accusations, punishment without hearing the child's explanation, refusal to listen patiently, exposing faults before siblings, speaking to annoy, and striking in anger humiliate without correcting and can seem cruel and unfair, fostering hatred, opposition, retaliation, and a combative spirit. A father's harshness and lack of patience can in this way damage his children's faith and contribute to their impenitence.
Such provoking stirs the worst feelings of their nature and arouses opposition and feelings almost of hatred toward parents. It keeps children from loving the Bible and drives them away from parents and from God. A passionate, fretful, impatient, harsh, or unkind word can discourage a child in a moment and drive the angels of God and the Holy Spirit from the home. Treating children roughly, ordering them about without respect, and perpetuating passionate traits is a work that pleases Satan.
The harsh seed sown stamps upon children character inherited from father and mother that will be revealed when they stand at the head of their own families. Unless thorough renovation of character takes place, their domestic life will repeat the same unchristlike example, making them coarse and rough and fitting them to become the same kind of families, so passionate hereditary traits are perpetuated. Losing temper, scolding, or striking passionately also teaches quarrelsome behavior even while claiming to enforce firm discipline. Exacting, independent, arbitrary rule that permits no liberty of will makes children fear without loving, shortens the wife's days, and after her long-suffering and patient waiting drives her to nervousness, distraction, contempt, rebellion against unjust authority, and almost to desperation.
Home Mission and Accountability
The command lays a binding duty of Christian missionary work in the home upon parents, and especially upon fathers as God-fearing educators to raise children in the Lord's way rather than by harshness that breaks their courage. The father stands as house-band of the family and accountable steward of a sacred trust who must command his children and household after him to keep the way of the Lord. He stands also as priest encircling the family and as its binding band to preserve the love of Christ in heart and mind and to bind the children to his own heart, while the mother stands as queen and educator from babyhood, and neither has liberty to indulge impatience at home. The home must be kept as a home for Christ and a home of prayer marked by sweetness and the grace of God, with the mouth held closed against every passionate, fretful, impatient, harsh or unkind word, because such words in a moment arouse the worst feelings, irritate wife and children to resentment and loss of heart, discourage the child, and drive away the angels of God and the Holy Spirit. Because the children have been brought into the world and are God's children, parents have no right to neglect one soul in the house for business or other things, but must carry on a constant work to bring every soul up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. That work teaches respect for religious things and the love of God and that Jesus Christ gave His life that they might have eternal life, trains the little ones to help and to overcome every wrong habit, trains them away from tobacco, liquor and sinful practices that weaken brain nerve strength, brain power and physical strength and bring body, mind and soul under darkness, and corrects offenses by sitting down with Scripture and showing consequences, putting this work before wheat, corn or business so that parents and children are not lost but enter together at the gate of the city of God.
Children are the Lord's heritage and God's property given to parents to save and to educate for heaven, to guard from the evils they will meet, and therefore fathers must give them due respect. They must govern with self-control, patience, courtesy and love rather than with a high hand that shows no respect, and must not treat children like dogs to be ordered about, nor deal with them by scolding, beating, and a passionate, rough manner. Such rule by force, blows, impatience, or arbitrary display of power provokes them to anger and discourages them, makes conduct worse and will not win love, makes them coarse and rough and fits them to become the same kind of families, perpetuating passionate hereditary traits, a work that pleases Satan. The duty binds even those who have overcome appetite for tobacco and liquor and who keep the Sabbath at financial loss, for they still must learn kindness and restraint toward their children. A father must fulfill his duties with care and regard for the effect of his conduct, keeping his example sacred and worthy of respect, and parents must share the responsibility of training and speak no word of disrespect about one another in the children's hearing. Instead they must bring the light of heaven and the converting power of God into the home, be Christlike as Christians, talk to them kindly and tenderly about what it is their privilege to have and what it is their privilege to shun, tell them heaven is watching and waiting to receive them if they will repent and come to God, and not rest until the family is united in faith, for if they fail the blame is their own.
Parents are laborers together with God who form a family firm with their children, and whenever possible parents and children should be kept together under loving parental watchcare as a sacred privilege. Belonging to that firm means parents must patiently and kindly restrain children from evil with mercy, tenderness and intelligent care, letting patience have her perfect work with the different temperaments in the family, and such restraint is a constant school that will make children a blessing to the school. The duty laid on parents matches the duty of children to obey in the Lord and binds mothers as well as fathers. Failure leaves sin at the door of parents and often makes parents more guilty than their children, since waywardness often comes from mismanagement. God takes account of how children are corrected, so correction must be given without anger, harshness, cruelty or unreasonable severity, but with patience, gentleness, sorrow and pity, requiring obedience while remembering that parents themselves are under God's discipline, that their example and kindly treatment may help children grow in love and respect.
Loss of self-command that stirs children to anger and discourages them instead of correcting them comes in large part from eating improperly, whether from bad quality of food or too great a quantity even of good food. Such eating calls nervous energy to the stomach, breaks up circulation, leaves no vitality for self-control, and makes parents fretful and impatient toward their children, unable to reason from cause to effect. In that state they act blindly and violently in their families, shaking a child or striking an impatient blow that does not subdue wrong but makes the child worse and creates more trouble than it cures.
Even when children think they were treated with severity in childhood, cherishing a spirit of retaliation and revenge against parents, especially when they are old and feeble, does not help them grow in grace and in the knowledge of Christ or reflect His image. The very helplessness and necessities of an aged father and sick, old mother plead for love and call forth the noble feelings of the heart. Through the grace of Christ parents are to be treated with kind attention, respect, kindness and love, the sweetest fruits of Christian life, and the heart is not to be made as adamant as steel, for one professing the name of Christ cannot cherish hatred against father and mother.