Some Thoughts On Parenting
The commandment we are diving into this week is the fifth commandment Honor your father and your mother. That is a big command. And it carries with is so much responsibility. As the parent of young children this is a command that I read and think about teaching my children to obey me. But this is really not the main thrust of the command. This is a command that talks so much about the nature of relationship between parents and children.
This command has as much to say about our responsibility as parents as it does our responsibility as children. Part of the reason parents are expected to be honored by their children, is that parents bear the responsibility of giving their children an identity rooted in their faith. God expected parents to be the primary shapers of their children’s spiritual lives.
This is a very different idea of spiritual development than we have in the church. Often we think it is primarily the role of the pastor or Sunday school teacher or youth worker to shape our children’s faith. But that is not how God intended it. God expects parents to be the primary shapers of faith for our children.
So what does this mean for our parenting? Well first and foremost it means that your own spirituality with greatly affect your children’s. What they see in you will be modeled. This is true for mom and dad alike. If one parent is engaged spiritually but the other isn’t there can be far reaching consequences for your children. It also means that when you make decisions about your family life, God needs to be a priority in those decisions. If Jesus isn’t a priority in your home, he will most likely never be a priority for your children.
That is a huge responsibility to bear and that is why God says parents should be honored. Carrying that burden alone is reason enough to give honor to our parents, even if we as parents don’t always fulfill this responsibility.
Blessings,
Pastor Greg