You Can't Raise Children on Rules Alone

It is our job not to manufacture godly children. It is our job to faithfully disciple the children God has given us. Marie and I have four. Cain and Abel grew up in the same house.

Children do not only walk away with what we taught them. They walk away with what they experienced in the home. How we live. How we apologize. How we treat each other.

Deuteronomy 6 is not a classroom. It is the day. When you sit in the house. When you walk by the way. When you lie down. When you rise up. Pastor Sexton called those the golden moments.

Proverbs 22:6 gets used like a promise you can cash. We think that verse is about the bend God put in that child, not a guarantee that your method cannot fail. One child is not the other. Train her in the way she should go. Train him in the way he should go.

You cannot raise children on rules alone. No is easy. When they ask why, that is not always rebellion. A short reason will keep the door open. The goal is a child who chooses what is right when you are not in the room.

Do not confuse a compliant child with a godly child. A child can keep the rules and be far from God. A child can be hard to live with and be the one crying out for help in the morning. Judas could be trusted with the bag. God looks deeper than the behavior you can score.

Punishment is not the same as discipline. Punishment answers the act. Discipline teaches the right thing and aims at restoration. Lying is an event. Liar is an identity. A just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again. The first word after a child fails is the word they remember. Make it a stepping stone, not a stumbling block.

If a child questions something you treated as settled, do not go to war. Have the long conversation. Do not change God's Word to fit what they want. If it is black and white in Scripture, stand there and speak the truth in love. If it is your application, say so. Keep the door open. Stay in the game.

Son, give me thine heart. We have asked our children for that. Make sure they know you love them, and that God loves them.

Watch the episode:
https://youtu.be/g8j3EiX_Ur8

Deuteronomy 6:7. Proverbs 22:6. Proverbs 23:26. Proverbs 24:16.

If this helped, send it to a parent who is tired of being the rule book. Not as a lecture. As a reminder to stay in the game.