Do you find yourself threatening, repeating your instructions, or raising your voice in an attempt to get your children to obey? Do you feel guilty because you know you should be faithfully training and instructing your children in righteousness but you're not sure how? Are you frustrated because it seems you just can't reach the heart of your child?
Good news - the Bible provides a treasure chest of wisdom for parents that will richly bless their child-training efforts. God has saturated His Word with nuggets of gold. A wise parent will dig out those valuable nuggets and invest them in the lives of their children.
Unfortunately, many parents today focus only on the outward behavior of their children, having assumed the philosophy that by getting their children to act right (to behave), they are raising them the right way. Yet parenting involves more than getting children to "act" right. As parents, we must get them to "think" right and to be motivated out of a love of virtue rather than a fear of punishment.
We do this by training them in righteousness. Righteous training can only come from the Word of God. "All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness" (2 Timothy 3:16). God has provided us with everything we need for effective parenting. The key is learning how to "flesh out" the Scriptures in the everyday struggles our children face.
When children sinfully express themselves by disobeying, throwing temper tantrums, talking back, lying, etc., they are drawing from what is in their hearts. Parents need to realize the importance of reaching past the outward behavior and pulling out the issues of the heart. Pastor Al Jackson says, "The heart of the problem is the problem of the heart." The heart is the well from which all of the responses to life gush forth. "Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life" (Proverbs 4:23). The behavior a child exhibits is an expression of the child's heart. To put it simply...the heart determines behavior.
Probe their Hearts. "The purposes of a man's heart are deep waters, but a man of understanding draws them out" (Proverbs 20:5). Jesus set the ultimate example for how to probe the heart of another in order to draw out what lies within. When dealing with sinners, Jesus did not shake his finger at their faces and tell them what they were doing wrong. Instead, He would ask thought-provoking questions in such a way that the person to whom he was talking had to take his focus off of the circumstances around him and onto the sin in his own heart. Heart-probing questions cause people to evaluate themselves.
When parents merely tell a child what his problem is and what he ought to do about it, they are hindering him from learning how to "think" like a Christian. This child will become handicapped in the area of discerning matters of his own heart. When children learn to evaluate their own hearts and biblically deal with the sin found there, they learn to govern their own behavior. This is how they grow in wisdom and character.
