Ephesians 6:4

Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

[6:1] Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. [2] “Honor your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), [3] “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.”

[4] Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Transcript:

The story of the slab of marble

Notice the progression of Ephesians chapter 5:

Be imitators of God (Ephesians 5:1)

All believers are to walk in love (just as Christ) (Eph 5:2)

Do not imitate the world (Eph 5:3-17)

Be filled with the Spirit (Eph 5:18)

Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ (Eph 5:21)

How we submit to one another: wives, husbands, children, parents

Imitate Christ in your marriage (Eph 5:22-32)

Wives respect, husbands love your spouse (Eph 5:33)

Children:

Imitate Christ

Be filled with the Spirit

Submit to your parents

Obey and honor, in other words, Love and respect your parents (Eph 6:1-3)

Submit your time to your children (6:4)

What we see in this passage is an accumulated understanding of the roles within the church, within the marriage, and within the family.

In their study Unraveling Juvenile Delinquency , Harvard University sociologists Sheldon and Eleanor Glueck identified four crucial factors in preventing future delinquency in young children:

1. The father’s firm, fair, and consistent discipline.
2. The mother’s supervision and companionship during the day.
3. The parents’ demonstrated affection for each other and for the children.
4. The family’s cohesiveness—time spent together in activities where all participate.

The Bible says the same thing.

The responsibility of children – 3 questions

What should children be expected to do?

Ephesians 6:1-3 – obey and honor, action and attitude, love and respect

What should parents be doing?

Proverbs 22:6

Train up a child in the way he should go;

even when he is old he will not depart from it.

What should we be training them to do?

Parents should be helping their children to understand how to please the Lord until they are spiritually mature enough to make godly decisions for themselves. They should then reinforce these decisions by living faithfully, praising feverishly, and rebuking frequently.

Ephesians 6:1-3

Children – tekna, all ages under the authority, living under the roof of their parents.

Obey, hupakouo, is made up of the Greek words for under and listen and literally means to “hear under” or to listen attentively and to respond positively. Children are to put themselves under the words and authority of their parents.

Submit is hupotasso – to place under

Within God’s family there is the constant battle to place ourselves under, whereas the result of the curse in Genesis 3 is to rule OVER.

In the Lord, refers to obedience to parents as a way in which we please Christ. When we obey are parents we are doing that which pleases Jesus. In addition, in the lord, also refers to the boundary in which we are to obey. We are to do that which Jesus would want us to obey. If our parents ask us to disobey a direct command of the Lord this verse tells us that we have an obligation to Jesus first. The parent who asks their child to lie, who encourages their child to skip church, who encourages their child to do something contrary to God’s word is the sinner and not the “disobedient” child. In a sense, in the Lord, is a reminder to the child of who we are truly obeying and honoring and it is also a rebuke to the parent who seeks to force a child to disobey the commands of God.

For this is right. Right refers to that which is correct, just, righteous. To obey and honor parents is to do exactly what is right, exactly what God desires, and to do exactly what we should be doing.

As we said, obedience is the right action of the child.

The right attitude that must also be cultivated is HONOR. This word means to value highly, to hold in the highest regard and respect.

If the husband is to submit through love, and the wife is to submit through respect, children are to submit through love and respect, obedience and honor, action and attitude.

Exodus 20:12 is the command to honor your mother and father.

So important was this command that in Exodus 21:15 and Leviticus 20:9 we see that “he who strikes or he who cureses his father or mother shall be put to death.” Physical or verbal abuse of a parent was a capital offense.

Jesus added to this when he said in Matthew 15:3-6 that the honoring of parents includes financially looking after them later in life when necessary.

And so, children are to obey and honor their parents – Obey has to do with action and honor has to do with attitude

What should our children do?

The warnings of Proverbs to children.

The book of Proverbs was and continues to be the best source for parenting in the world.

The Proverbs are essentially a series of lessons for parents to teach their children. Here is the theme of these lessons:

Proverbs 1:8

Prov 3:1

Prov 4:1-4

Prov 7:1-3

Prov 10:1

Ephesians 6:4

Christian psychiatrist Paul Meier M.D. said the key to right parent/child relationships can be summed up in these five things. One, love, parents loving each other and their children. Two, discipline, setting a standard and making people live by that standard or pay the consequence. Three, consistency. Consistency is very very important. When you’re dealing with a child it isn’t important that you be perfect, no one expects that. It is important that you be consistent. Both parents need to stick together, use the same rules, consistently enforce those rules so that a child doesn’t get away with something one time and get punished for the same thing another time, it needs to be consistent. You have love, discipline, consistency. The fourth thing is example…example. In healthy families the parents never expect children to live up to a standard they themselves do not keep.

Fathers – sometimes used of parents in general (Hebrews 11:23)

Do not provoke – parorgizo – para, beside; orgizo, become angry. To irritate, exasperate

• A repeated, ongoing pattern of treatment

we provoke our children to anger when we exhibit:

1. fear
2. failure
3. faithlessness
4. frustration – never being able to satisfy a parent’s demands
5. favoritism
6. friendship – lean on them emotionally

Children who are little Christs, fulfilling our emotional needs

Children who are a little God the Father, they can do no wrong

Children who are a little Holy Spirits, we go to them with everything instead of to prayer

Our children should never replace the role of God in our lives – no child worship

7. futility
8. fastidiousness – we overprotect
9. foolishness – immaturity. The immature parent is not cool, they are embarrassing. The parent that tries to be the friend of their child’s friends and supplies
10. frenzy – Another way you can exasperate your child is by over- indulgence. Give them everything they want and you know what, if they don’t get the next thing they want, they get angry. Have you noticed that? Have you noticed at Christmas when they get way more than they can possibly get that when some other kid picks up one thing that they’ve got out of a dozen they get angry? That will just move on in to adulthood. Over-indulgence leads to anger when they don’t get what they want.
11. fuming – anger

Do not let the sun go down on your anger

It takes a loving father and a respectful mother to have children who are loving and respectful

The 10 Commandments and why Paul uses honor your mother and father

Fathers who provoke their children to anger are causing them to sin and giving the devil a foothold

Bill Gothard:

“Your sons and daughters do not really “belong” to you. “Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD” (Psalm 127:3). Rather, they have been entrusted to you for a time so that you can train them to be “mighty upon earth” (Psalm 112:2).

God instructs fathers to raise their children “in the nurture and admonition of the Lord” (Ephesians 6:4). An important factor in accomplishing this goal is getting to know each child as a unique individual so that you can respond to his or her needs and effectively motivate him or her in God’s ways. This is what the Apostle Paul did with those he taught and discipled.

“… Remember how we dealt with each one of you personally, like a father with his own children …” (I Thessalonians 2:11-12—J. B. Phillips Translation).

A father will have great difficulty guarding his sons and daughters from false teachers if he does not know what is going on in their hearts. He must seek to understand them and demonstrate his unconditional love and acceptance of them. Fathers who cultivate open, honest communication with their sons and daughters are more likely to be trusted with “sensitive” information that parents need to be aware of in their children’s lives. This includes lies they are believing, their fears, secret sins, wrong friendships, temptations they are facing, and hurts and offenses they are harboring.

An effective way to begin getting to know the heart of your child is to plan an outing with him or her and ask a variety of questions. Allow him or her to answer the questions without receiving any negative reaction or disapproval from you. Any information he or she shares with you should be regarded as a gift, so avoid correction, and instead express gratefulness.”

Sons and daughters give their hearts to those who listen to them with patience, acceptance, and understanding.

6 questions to ask:

1. Am I teaching my child to obey?: the need for absolutes

2. Do I give my child opportunities to obey?

3. Positive discipline: Do I reward my child for obedience or simply expect it?

4. What is my child filling their mind with? Does it promote obedience?

5. As Proverbs teaches, am I teaching my child responsibilities or am I teaching them about their rights? And I quote, “The world has much to say today about children’s so-called rights. But the emphasis should be on responsibilities. Emphasis on rights – whether by children or adults – weakens and destroys relationships on every level. It is the sense of responsibility that builds right relationships as well as right character.”

6. Is my child growing in 4 key areas?

Luke 2:51-52

[51] And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. And his mother treasured up all these things in her heart.

[52] And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.

Intellectually

Physically

Spiritually

Socially

Every child must grow in these 4 areas. We tend to want in our children what the culture wants to the neglect of the most important quality: Spiritually

One last thing to mention

Ephesians 6:1-3 ends this way:

” (this is the first commandment with a promise), [3] “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.”

Quality of life and Quantity of life. The apostle Paul shows us that these verses are still relevant for us today. Men, women and children have not changed, Satan’s desire to destroy God’s work has not changed. Societies battle against truth and against the godly family has not changed. But neither has God’s word changed.

To the family that submits to one another God is promising a family experience that is loving, joyful and deeply satisfying.

 

There is an old Proverb which says, “One generation plants the trees and the next gets the shade.” Parenting is the hard work of planting that we might see fruit in the next generation.

Let me close with this written prayer:

Father in heaven,

I thank You for these wonderful families in our church who have done this, who are raising a godly generation.  I thank You for the joy in my own heart to be in this church long enough to see the next generation coming along.  How wonderful.  How wonderful so many families have disciplined their children and they’re being raised in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

How wonderful to see children learning Bible verses, children loving the Scripture, children loving Jesus, children loving mom and dad and grandma and grandpa, children loving each other, children who want to serve You, who want to honor You, who want to obey You as they do their parents.  Lord, how wonderful and how important this is, how crucial.

Help us to be faithful parents in the discipline process and realize as well that it is our obedience that becomes the model for their obedience.  It is our respect for one another, as mom and dad, that shows them what respect for us should be.  It’s when I respect my wife and she respects me that they understand what respect is.  And it’s when we both together obey You that they understand what obedience means.

And, Lord, make us to be faithful in this area that You might be honored in our lives and in our families, and another generation of godly children can become key witnesses should Jesus tarry to the generations ahead.  Give us families, Lord, like You’ve designed.  And may we not get so sucked up into this culture that we fail to provide shade for the children to come.  We commit ourselves afresh and anew to this as parents and grandparents, and as a church.  Collectively may we serve in this way for Your glory in Christ’s name.  Amen

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