Ephesians 6:4, HCSB
I had decided that I wouldn't make another post about parenting this week, but today (well, technically, tomorrow; I'm posting this an hour early) is Father's Day.
I had the "Children, obey your parents" verse repeated countless times to me--and sometimes at me--when I was young and still living in my parents' home. Whether I felt like obeying or not, the command was a valid one. It was sometimes (okay, often) frustrating to hear the verse in a conversation, but our human nature bristles at the word "obey" and all the baggage it picks up as we grow up.
Now, as a new parent, I'm looking at Ephesians 6:4 as more than an adolescent rebuttal to my parents. (It was, of course, always much more, but that's difficult to accept as a teenager.)
The fiction writer in me loves the language of this verse: "Don't stir up anger." It inspires mental images of witches and cauldrons for me, but I might be alone in that.
The journalist in me wants to rephrase and simply the language for mass consumption. My paraphrase of the verse: "Dads, don't make your kids angry. Raise them to serve the Lord."
I still prefer the original language, of course.
It's important to note that "don't stir up anger in your children" is immediately followed by "bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord." Paul's decision to place these two thoughts immediately next to each other suggests he foresaw the potential abuse of this verse and sought to nip it in the bud. In raising a child in the "training and instruction of the Lord," discipline will be required.
Yes, disciplining a child in love will sometimes (and probably often) result in the child, in his or her rebellious nature, feeling anger. The phrase, "Don't stir up anger" is not equivalent to "Make sure your kids are never, ever angry at you" (thus making my earlier paraphrase that much weaker).
Well, it seems I've rambled a bit, but I hope everyone, especially the fathers in our community, find encouragement, conviction, and guidance in this passage.
