Back in the Sixties, Crosby, Stills and Nash made popular a song called "Teach Your Children Well."  I always thought it amusing that men who crashed and burned personally would write a song about parenting.  The song tells parents they should have a code to live by so their children won't turn out as bad as they are.  Those three guys knew what they were taking about.

          Moses said, "Teach your children well, in your home or when you walk or when you lie down."  Never before in history has the home been so important a teaching place, and perhaps never before has it been such a poor place to learn.  Parental teaching of values in homes across our country is being replaced by music, videos and computers.  Rules for life are being replaced by the rules of league athletics, and Sunday School and worship replaced by Sunday morning events (such as today's Elephant Rock bike rides).  Bit by bit, family and church are being replaced by school and community as the teacher of values to the young.

          Fortunately this is all recent, a trend I truly pray will soon be reversed.  While there is some value in sports or other Sunday morning family outings, substituting prayer with play comes at a price.  Most people think Sunday morning activities are harmless, not realizing that when God gets the back seat, the rest of life suffers.  But like the frog slowly warming in the kettle, we may one day find out it's too late to change our course.

          And these are not my ideas, but God's.  His Word commands adults to teach their children in His ways, to bring them to worship and teach them well.  God knows how tough it is to be a parent these days.  Satan's latest trick is to keep people busy with seemingly good things, but crowding out what is more important.  A catalog of events now comes between people and God, resulting in children who know all about the world, but little about God.

          It's not easy being a parent today, but then it never has been.  If you think of it, a parent's bond with a child begins with total intimacy in the act of birth, and ends with near-estrangement as the child leaves home.  Raising a child takes love and forgiveness, but also a lot of pain and even a bit of hostility.  Almost everything a parent can do for a child, you've done for them by age ten.  You've protected them from disease and death;  you've encouraged them to walk and talk and read and perhaps to think.  Everything a parent does after this is just a series of footnotes.  Past a certain point in their development our children are just picking up our mistakes.

          And then nature wants us to cut them loose!  But it's all part of God's plan.  It's really true - adolescence is God's way of making sure our kids don't live with us forever.  And when you're a good parent, and kind and understanding, it's even harder to cut them loose, but even more necessary.  In a series of painful events, they leave home to live and work and love.  Then years later they come back with all kinds of advice, and maybe even try to put you in a nursing home!  Then the parent becomes the child, and the child the parent.  It's a reversal of roles that happens to just about every parent who lives past eighty.

          This is the Word of God Moses told His people:  "And now, O Israel, what does the LORD your God ask of you but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul." (Deuteronomy 10:12)   Moses was the "parent" of Israel, teaching his "children."  He said, "Fix these words of mine in your hearts and minds and tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads.  Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road..."

          Several years ago when Carol and I flew to Israel, we saw how literally orthodox Jews live out these words.  At the appointed times during the flight, men stood up, tied black leather bands to their forearms and hung the leather pouches on their heads, keeping their heads covered to show reverence for God.  Then they'd begin praying, rocking to and fro in their earnestness before God, and also before everyone else.  Often they got in the way of the flight attendants who respectfully walked around them.  I wonder if they can do that on the street corners, especially in some public place.  It'd probably be labeled mixing of church and state.

          Last Wednesday I went to the Justice Center to have Epiphany approved as a site for people to do community service time and was told community service at a church was against the law, a mixing of church and state.  Evidently a lawbreaker doing community service time mowing our lawn would be breaking other laws.  I asked what if being near a church would help a criminal.  She said it didn't matter, that it was a matter of policy, not common sense.  We Americans have become such masters at taking an idea to its logical extreme and wrecking it!

          Moses said, "Teach these commands to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up."  Great idea, but who takes walks with their children any more?  We drive everywhere.  And with our busy roads, parents surely can't teach while driving.  Indeed, parent drivers are glad if no one says a word in the car, let alone asks a question.  Navigating the latest road construction takes concentration!  And they'd probably not be able to do much teaching anyway since most youthful passengers are immediately connected to their headphones or Gameboy.

          The Word of God here is a command to teach our children well, in the ways of God so they are ready for the ways of the world.  We must teach them right and wrong according to God's ways, not the ways of the world.  Actually adults are teaching all the time.  Whether we realize it or not, kids are watching us every waking moment.  Values are caught, not taught.  They learn by what they hear and see us do, rarely by what we tell them.  How quickly they see our hypocrisy when we say one thing and do another.  But just as rude behavior is learned, so are little lessons in kindness and caring.  But some of our children must learn the hard way, on paths of their own making.

          Last Wednesday I called the hospital to inquire about a patient and heard a familiar voice: "Hey Pastor Bob, this is Marlita!"  My goodness, Marlita, the holy terror of school and church and confirmation class a dozen years ago, Marlita, the one who did all things her own way.  By the time she was sixteen, Marlita had seen most of life's ugly underside.  She had abandoned church, done drugs, slept around, run away from home and spent a summer of rehab in a last-chance program for wayward teens.  I'd last seen her waiting tables, and now here she was, a technician in a trauma ward!  An angry rebel, sick of society, was just two semesters away from nursing sick people.  Marlita learned things the hard way, but somewhere her Christian training never left her.  She doesn't attend church often, but she's become an incredibly nice person.

          Some children just learn the hard way, and the best parents in the world can't make a bad child good.  Only God can do that.  Some children go the wrong way no matter what.  Samuel the prophet, was as kind and loving a parent as ever lived, yet his sons turned aside after dishonest gain and accepted bribes (1 Samuel 8:3).  The sons of Eli the High Priest chased after women and other gods.  The Bible tells us again and again how good parents raised bad children.  And we can't just blame parents for being too busy.  No matter how poorly we may raise our children, it is their responsibility to come to faith.  Parents are not responsible FOR our children's spiritual growth, only to give them a chance to come to faith.  When they're young we must care for them and train them.  But our children must come to faith.  Parents can't believe for their children, but they can be good examples of God's love, teaching them right and wrong, and encouraging them to faith in the Lord.  But God has no grandchildren.  Every generation must come to God by itself.

          Joe tried his best to be a good Dad, but when his wife abandoned them, he was left alone to raise his children.  And Joe fell apart.  He was bitter that she deserted them, became withdrawn, and got angry with his kids over the smallest things.  He even contemplated suicide but knew he could not bring his children any more hurt.  Finally he got some counselling, and after a few years married a wonderful woman who loved and helped raise his children.  Fifteen years after those dark and terrible days, he received a plaque, a gift from their new college graduate son.  It was titled, "To My Christian Parents."  It said, "You are my parents and I love you.  Your guidance and direction have helped me more than words can express.  In the struggles of life you were sensitive to my needs.  When I doubted, you encouraged me.  When I needed help, you were there.  When I sought independence you patiently yielded, allowing me to learn from my own decisions.  I saw your faith in God and learned that God loves me, too.  You helped me spiritually and stressed the importance of honesty and integrity.  Your love for me has been generous and yet tempered with the realities of life.  For this I will be forever grateful.  You're both very special to me and I will love you always."  It was signed "Billy, 1995"

          Teach your children well, my friends, but be sure God is in the picture.  Mary and Joseph were the only parents who ever had a perfect child.  Jesus was the perfect child none of us could ever have or ever be.  He died an innocent death for a world that will always struggle to keep its priorities straight.  And only He can forgive us for the wrong choices we make.  Thanks be to God that our Lord chose the right things for us:  love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness, goodness and self-control.  He gave them to us through the Holy Spirit and urges us to live them each day.  May God give us joy in seeing our children one day in heaven.  Amen

Copyright © 2002 by Pastor Bob Tasler.  All rights reserved.