God’s Plan for Parenting
Colossians 3:20-21
Primary Purpose: To discuss God’s plan for parenting.
Here Paul moves from discussing marriage to specifically discussing
the parent-child relationship. It’s nice to know that God has a plan for
parenting. It may be that parenting is one of the most difficult jobs on earth.
We seem to have more and more parents who don’t take their role in their
children’s lives seriously. A man named Warren Wiersbe once said that
“children don’t create problems they reveal them.” This seems true for the
most part. They reveal where their parents have failed to teach them right
and wrong and whether or not they have been instructed in the Lord.
A study once disclosed tht if both Mom and Dad attend church
regularly, 72% of their children remain faithful to church attendance. If only
Dad, 55% remain faithful. If only Mom, 15%. If neither attend regularly,
only 6% remain faithful. This statistic speaks for itself. It shows the impact
of the parents on the children and their faith.
Paul gives the children and then the parents some clear instructions about
God’s will for them. Read Scripture and Ephesians 6:1-4
1. Children should obey their parents v.20 One of the qualities that Paul lists
of children in the last days is that they will be disobedient to parents. 2 Tim
3:2. It seems that we are in these last days. Parent don’t teach their children
to respect authority anymore. I see this reflected in many of the youth who
come to our church on Wednesdays. They didn’t respect Matt when he was
trying to teach them, they didn’t respect me when I was trying to teach and
many of them don’t show any respect to Marva either. Their parents haven’t
spent the time teaching their children when they are young.
It is natural for children to test limits. They want to find out where the
boundaries are. You don’t need to teach a child to say “no” or “mine” they
pick it up without difficulty. Part of the role of parents is teaching their
children to share, to give, to forgive, to love others. We are by nature selfish,
part of our role as parents is to teach otherness to our children.
We should show our children and grandchildren how good it can feel
to help others. That’s what I really appreciate now about work camp that I
attended for 3 years at church. We went to help others who were elderly or
handicapped and couldn’t do for themselves. You might fix a roof or paint a
house or put a railing on a set of stairs or clean up some property. I
remember one lady in Bryan, Texas. We helped clean the lot next to her
home. It looked like the jungles in Africa. We took in swing blades and then
mowers and cut down the talls grass. It was hard work. But, it didn’t feel
like it was as hard as it was because I knew I was helping someone who
couldn’t do this for themselves and couldn’t afford to pay to have it done.
That made a big impression on me as a 17 year old.
A father once said to his son, “You’d better get ready. The bus will be
here in a minute to pick you up and take you to Sunday School.” The boy
asked, “Did you go to Sunday School when you were a boy?” The father
replied, “Yes, I did.”
The boy said as he was getting dressed, “It probably won’t do me any
good either.”
That little boy was saying something about how much the church had
made a impact on his father’s life. That’s the sermon that the kids remember.
They want to find out what is important from you as a parent. Part of
the way I show love to a child is by saying “no”, by consistently setting
limits, by teaching them what is important in life. In one recent survey,
fathers were said to spend only 37 seconds a day in conversation with their
boys. How do you teach anyone anything important in 37 seconds a day?
One of the ways I demonstrate love to my children is spending time with them
and consistently setting limits.
It can be said that,
If a child lives with criticism,
He learns to condemn.
If a child lives with hostility,
He learns to fight.
If a child lives with ridicule,
He learns to be shy.
If a child lives with shame,
He learns to feel guilty.
If a child lives with tolerance,
He learns to be patient.
If a child lives with encouragement,
He learns confidence
If a child lives with praise,
He learns to appreciate.
If a child lives with fairness,
He learns justice.
If a child lives with security, He learns to have faith.
If a child lives with approval,
He learns to like himself.
If a child lives with approval,
He learns to like himself.
If a chld lives with acceptance and friendship,
He learns to find love in the world.
2. Realize as a parent you are a steward of your child. Deut 4:9-10. The
Lord’s admonish to us is to be careful that you don’t forget what God has
done for you and to make sure to pass down your faith to your children and
grandchildren. God has given each parent a responsibility to train up their
children in the Lord. This cannot be passed on to someone else, it is yours.
Prov 22:6 says to “train us a child in the way he should go and when he is old
he will follow it.” We are to do our part to train up our children and
grandchildren in the Lord.
A man named Don Highlander once said that “As parents we are
working in partnership with God to bring our children from a self-centered
lifestyle to a God-centered and other centered basis for living.” Our goal is
according to Dr.Charles Stanley “to produce responsible adults who are able
to function independently of parent’s authority , yet wholly submitted to
God’s”.
3. Remember to be fair in discipline. God is always our model in discipline.
God treats us with grace, not as we deserve. He treats us fair and is quick to
forgive. He is motivated by love and operates out of love. Verse 21 tells
parents not to punish their child so they become discouraged. There is two
dangers in parenting, one is being too lenient. The failure to set rules and to
be consistent with them. The other is to be too rigid and harsh. To set
impossible standards that your children cannot live up to. This quenches the
spirit of a child. Heb 12:7-10
