21.8.22p - Ephesians 6.1-3 - Submission in the Family

Most generations throughout time have grown up in a simpler time than we or our children have. We have been reading through the book Little Cabin in the Big Woods. It is a portrayal of a very simple life. Those who lived out in the country or in small towns were brought up in a situation where their only source of information was their parents and their small town community. Their lives were spent working on a farm, going to school, and playing with their friends. It just sounds so simple. Even in the larger cities, children would go to school and play with their friends. I’m sure that the pictures those books paint are not a depiction of everyone’s reality, but they show us a time of simplicity that is nothing like our day. We live in a world of television, radio, internet, computers, smart phones, tablets, and social media. All of our advances have created so much information for children and so many influences. But God has a plan for children that is clear and simple.

Parents are faced with an enormous challenge as a result. They are fighting to overcome the influence of the world like never before. The world tells our children to do what feels right, make your own decisions, rebel against your parents, and take what you want. We, as parents are told never to hit our children. They just need more self-esteem. If your child isn’t acting right after you explain what you want from them, something is wrong with them and you should give them medication. I have seen social media being used to guilt parents who are disciplining their children. In one case a mom was recorded after she brought her children out to the car to punish them. That recording was shared on facebook by many people. The world makes parenting today complicated, but God’s word is clear and simple.

God’s Desire For Children

Ephesians 6.1-3

First, we see the majority of our text is pointing towards children. Paul tells the children to “obey their parents in the Lord, for this is right.” In the second half of this letter, Paul has been explaining to the Ephesians how they can live worthy of the calling they have received from God. But this is a word to children. Children have the same hope as adults. They have the same blessings promised to them. But they have one command, to obey and honor their parents.

God wants children to be obedient toward their parents. He is not okay with them sewing their wild roots. He wants them to listen to and obey their parents. Without that obedience they are failing in their sole responsibility. To obey is not just about what they do. Parents are told to obey God and it’s not just about doing all the right things. To obey means to have a heart and a mind that wants to submit to the will of their father and mother, even when it is hard to do. That’s why he adds in the word “Honor.” To honor means to value highly. Children often value a specific toy, or the opinions of their peers. But God wants them to value the desires of their parents. He wants them to fervently pursue making mom and dad happy.

As a child, the world is going to tell you that your parents are wrong if they follow the Bible. The world will tell you to follow what is popular and what gives you joy. They claim that will lead you toward the best possible life, but God says that he is the one who will give you the best possible life. That’s why Paul says, “This is the first commandment with a promise that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.” Paul is telling children that obeying and honoring parents will result in the best possible life. I’ll tell you that is so true! I had so many opportunities to disobey and do the opposite of what my parents want me to do, but I chose to obey and I absolutely love my life. Now, bad things have happened to me, and it’s possible that bad things will happen to you. But we give ourselves the best possible chance at a good life when we obey and honor our parents. Their instruction is for our good!

This last week, Joseph decided to stick a lego up his nose and immediately regretted it as blood came pouring out. We have told him not to put these things in his mouth, nose, or ears, but he didn’t listen. Much worse things will happen in his life if he chooses to ignore our instruction and disobey. Undisciplined people begin as undisciplined children. Many of the drug addicts, alcoholics, and criminals of our day are the result of our world’s methodology on parenting. If you children want to destroy your future, it all starts with disobeying your parents. Absalom and Amnon, two sons of king David show us what happens with fathers refuse to discipline their children, and children refuse to obey their parents. Parents should remind their children of this command and encourage an obedience that is without arguing or delaying. We need to train them to obey with the right attitude and the right heart so that it will be easier for them to do the same thing with all of God’s commands. Here are some proverbs that should encourage us to teach them and encourage them to listen.

Proverbs 1.8

Proverbs 2:1-8

Proverbs 3:1-2

Proverbs 4:1-13

Proverbs 7:1-5

Proverbs 8:32-36

Proverbs 13:1

Proverbs 15:5

Proverbs 30:11-17

God’s Desire For Parents

Ephesians 6.4

Second, I want us to notice the brief command to parents. Specifically, notice that the command is to Fathers. Fathers are the head of the house. They are ultimately responsible for what happens with the children. Children are looking for a spiritual leader to guide them down the path they should go, and God has a special message for the fathers. This doesn’t exclude mothers. Mothers are submitting to the methodology given by the fathers so this instruction is primarily for fathers. The words are brief, but full of rich instruction. It is the father’s responsibility to teach their children to obey and honor them. That’s not easy, but it is God’s command to you.

As a father I know that children struggle to obey all the time just like I struggle to be the husband God wants me to be, and just like my wife struggles to be what God wants her to be. I struggle to sacrifice myself, and she sometimes struggles to submit. We are all very self-focused and we are easily tempted to disobey and dishonor our heavenly father. We don’t value his commands as highly as we value ourselves. But it is our responsibility to train our children to be better at this than we are. We need to “bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.”

Before he tells us that, though, he tells us not to “provoke our children to anger.” That’s an interesting idea. As I was studying this, I wanted to know what that means. First, I noticed that this is contrasted with the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Paul is saying that the tendency will be to provoke our children to anger, but the discipline and instruction of the Lord doesn’t do that.

How Do We Provoke Our Children To Anger?

Some think that any kind of negative discipline will provoke children to anger. That’s not true. God gives negative discipline, and he does it for our good. If his discipline provokes us to anger, it’s because we have the wrong heart and the wrong understanding about what he is doing and why he is doing it. So the parent should consider what kind of training will affect that heart and help the child overcome his problem. Sometimes more negative punishment may be needed to help with that, not less. Sometimes, the child is frustrated because he doesn’t understand why he is being punished. But other times, the child has not been punished consistently enough to cope with the fact that they cannot get their way. This is a very important principle to instill in children at an early age. We don’t get everything we want in life, and it doesn’t help us to become terrorists when things don’t go our way. If they don’t learn to accept loss and accept negative consequences for their actions, they will be angry all the time. So it could be said that refusing to use negative discipline will provoke children to anger and many other forms of foolishness. We have plenty of passages that lead us to believe this is true.

Proverbs 19:18

Proverbs 22:15

Proverbs 23:13

Proverbs 29:15

Now, let’s consider all the ways we can prevent our children form being angry aside from teaching them to cope with the discouragements of life.

1. Parents prevent their children from being angry by loving them. If we fail to show our children love and affection, they will give up. Love and attention are owed to our children. If we neglect them or act like they are an intrusion on our lives, we will provoke them to anger, depression, and they will not listen to us. We should not be wanting to farm out our children for other people to raise and train. They are our responsibility. We must be willing to sacrifice our time to make sure that they know we care about them. God wants them to feel his love through us.

But somethings are mistaken as love in our society. It’s not loving to spoil our child. That creates self indulgent adults. It’s not loving to create a dependence on the parent instead of teaching them independence and preparing them to be on their own. It’s not loving to prevent them from suffering consequences when they rebel. Finally, it’s not loving to show favoritism.

2. Parents prevent their children from being angry by encouraging them. Children fail a lot. It’s easy for them to get discouraged when they don’t understand what they are doing wrong or how to do things right. We must be careful not to lose patience with them, talk down to them, ridicule them, or compare them to their siblings in a disrespectful way. Don’t make them out to be greater than they are, but help them see the light at the end of the tunnel. There is always hope for them to grow out of their immature foolishness.

3. Parents also prevent their children from being angry by forgiving them. It’s good to let a child experience consequences for their rebellion, but children will act childish. They don’t understand the value of things and they make mistakes. We have to love our child more than we love our stuff. Sometimes, we just have to let go of the stuff they break, and forgive them to show them we love them more. We must never hold a grudge when they are truly sorry for what they have done. That is the kind of heart we want to see and forgive.

How Do We Discipline and Instruct Our Children?

God wants us to love our children enough to train them in the way they should go. Ephesians 6:4 says, “Bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” Discipline simply means training people to obey rules. That training should include positive and negative discipline. The child should experience consequences for disobedience. They need to know that if I hit my sibling, I will feel pain from my father. They need to know that disrespecting and disobeying my mother and father hurts because disobeying God hurts. People think that they are scaring their children by giving them any negative discipline, but punishment that fits the crime is actually preventing their destruction. Of course we also want that to be joined positive discipline. When they grow up, they will say, “They loved me and they spanked me.”

Positive discipline is rewarding good behavior. Our children should feel encouraged and motivated to do good. So many parents today shower gifts on mean and hateful children. Why not take away the gifts from mean children and shower the gifts when they act like they are supposed to. We can take away their devices as a form of negative discipline, and we can give them devices as a form of positive discipline. Every privilege should be seen as a training tool. Dessert is a training tool. Movie night is a training tool. Video games are a training tool. They get them when they listen, and lose them when they disobey.

I would also like to point out that our world tells us to pump our kids full of self-esteem. That comes from the belief that pride is a good thing. Kids don’t need to think they are smarter than they are. They don’t need to believe that they are entitled to everything. They need to understand the truth. This points to the “Instruction of the Lord.” God has instructed us in our lives, and our goal should be to pass that instruction on to our children. If you want to know what to teach your children, here is a summary that I mostly stole from John MacArthur, but I pretty much have been doing this myself.

Teach them about God’s holiness. They need to fear God and understand that he never does anything wrong. He is completely perfect and no one can stand before him or meet up to his righteousness.

Teach them that they are wrong. Children need to learn what we already know. They are not perfect. This is the opposite of building their self-esteem. I don’t say this so that parents will beat their children down verbally, but it’s important for parents to be honest about their children’s failures. We have to speak the truth in love. They need to know this because God hates sin, and once they reach the age of accountability, they need to feel the weight of their sin. We don’t want them justifying themselves or overlooking their mistakes. We want to train them to see them clearly.

Teach them that we all need grace. Everyone is guilty of doing wrong. Mommy and daddy made the same mistakes that they did when they were little. We made other mistakes as well, and we can’t fix a mistake by saying sorry. But that’s a starting place to find forgiveness. Also, it’s perfectly fine to help your children understand at an early age that God knew we couldn’t fix our mistakes so he came down to earth to help us find forgiveness. The greatness of this act can’t be overstated.

Finally, show them righteousness and the rewards of it. We want them to see that we don’t do what is right because we have to. Now that we know God we love God, and we want to do his commands. We believe that they are good for us and that he will deliver his promise of eternal life to us. We also believe that evil will be punished.

What’s The Problem?

The world is actively teaching children and parents to disobey God’s word. They want children to be demanding and act like adults. They want parents to be submissive and act like children. This world plays off of our selfishness and tempts us to let the world raise our children. Don’t fall for it. Don’t let the world make you feel bad for following God’s laws and helping your child find a good life.

What’s The Solution?

God’s word must overrule society. Our love for God must overrule our love for praise from men. Our love for our children must overrule our love for this world.

Conclusion

We have many different types of influences in our lives telling us to walk down different paths. The world is a tremendous influence now that mass media is in everyone’s pocket. But Christians are called to have one influence over all others. God’s word is supposed to be our lamp in the darkness. The world has conditioned us to believe obeying our parents is wrong and conditioned us to believe that disciplining our child is wrong. But we are taught that children must obey and honor their parents and parents must love and discipline their children. If we want children who listen to and obey the word of God, we must lead by example. I hate spanking my child, but I love obeying God.

This is God’s plan for submission in the family. Children obey and honor parents, submitting their will to their parent’s will. Parents submit their lives to loving, training, and disciplining their children like God does for us. We must constantly teach and train our children. This is our most important evangelism work, and our most important opportunity in life.