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

Hopefully the Scripture for last week’s sermon, Ephesians 6:4, has generated some discussion at your house. Paul’s instruction lays out the responsibility of parents but he doesn’t say how we are to do this. I wanted to follow-up with some practical suggestions for how we might apply this in today’s cultural setting. Here are some things you can do with just a little time in the mornings and the evenings.

1. Take advantage of Cornerstone School of Covenant and Kingdom on Wednesday nights. These are designed to help you train your children systematically in the teaching of Scripture about God, man, sin, Jesus, and redemption. A corresponding workbook is provided for each child that you can use as a family for discussion and follow-up.

2. Take Deuteronomy 6:7 as a “how-to” guide. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.

When you rise. Take a few minutes in the morning to review the Scripture passages in the CSCK workbook. It’s laid out to correspond to the Bible lessons your kids are learning on Wednesday nights. Or, open the Bible and read a chapter to them. If you do this with consistency, you’ll find that the Bible tells a readable story. You can start in Genesis and Exodus. There’s exciting stuff there. You can also interject the commandments as you see opportunity in the story to talk about them. This is something you can do with the whole family. You don’t have to make it longer than 5 minutes.

When you lie down. When you say goodnight to your children, take a few minutes to open the Bible with them (invite them to open theirs if they’re old enough) and read more of the Bible story from the morning. Again, when you do a little each day, the story stays fresh and it is easy to pick up where you leave off. Since you’re doing this one-on-one, you can tailor application questions to your child. The questions don’t have to be more than asking, “why do you think this happened?”

When you walk by the way. This statement invites you to get involved in your children’s lives. Volunteer as a coach or in their school. Watch movies with them and listen to their music. Teach them how to see what is true and what is skewed using the Bible as a lens.

When you sit in your house. Try using dinners together (when you’re able) to find out what’s going on at school or other things your children are involved in and help them think about what is good or right and what is bad or wrong from a Biblical perspective.

What things have worked for your family?

In Christ,
Carter