First, the word of God: “And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual men, but as to men of flesh, as to infants in Christ. I gave you milk to drink, not solid food; for you were not yet able to receive it. Indeed, even now you are not yet able” (1 Cor. 3:1-2).
The apostle Paul as well as Jude (verse 3) had to change their approach to their audience based on extenuating factors. For Jude, it was the threat of false teachers. For Paul, it was the maturity level of the Christians in Corinth. Our children change as they mature. They begin life being extremely dependent on mom and dad, then they grow to the point they are crawling and walking and running, often away from mom and dad. There’s a funny cartoon that has made its way around Facebook showing a parent trying to put their child on the bus to go to school and the child is holding on to the front porch post. A second cartoon shows the child trying to leave for college and the parent is holding on to him, trying to keep him home.
As your child grows, you have to grow and mature with him or her. You have to develop different ways of rearing, training, disciplining your child. You don’t spank a sixteen-year-old (for example). As our daughters matured, Rachel and I learned different ways to punish them. While I would not recommend this in general, we learned that taking away Jewell’s books and writing tools was a good way to discipline her!
Just your budget will change as the kids get older (I remember putting “clothes” into the budget when the girls became teenagers!), your approach to training them should also change. You give a five year old only a little freedom; but a teenager needs much more freedom. Mom and Dad have to adjust to that change.
Moms and Dads will start as authoritarians and then change into mentors and then become friends. The change is based on the maturity and development of the child. And, of course, the development of one child is independent of the development of another child. So parents might be authoritarians with one child but mentors with a different child.
As your child grows, communicate with your spouse and adjust your parenting to suit the needs of your children. Continue studying the Bible and praying and you’ll gain the wisdom need to parent your children biblically.
Paul Hlland
