Parenting and Family

Read Proverbs 22:6.

The word train refers to the process of teaching a newborn to eat. This is a beautiful picture of what God does with all of us. Scripture tells us, “Taste and see that the LORD is good!” (Ps. 34:8). God wants us to get a little taste of Jesus so that we’ll want a lot more of Him. Then that desire grows throughout our lives. That’s the background of the word train. Parents train up our children with a gentle application of the goodness, beauty, and joy of Jesus Christ. We lead them to see how good the Lord is. We lead them to taste and want more. This is the best way to prepare them for adulthood. Training them in the way they should go means nurturing them with the good grace and satisfying substance that Jesus is to our souls. That’s what we do when we parent our children.

The concept of discipline in these verses isn’t a picture of punishment or harsh treatment. Rather, the rod should remind us of a shepherd who devotes his life to caring for sheep. He uses his rod to gently nudge the sheep toward green pastures where they can eat or toward quiet waters where they can drink. If a sheep is running in the wrong direction, the shepherd can throw the rod and strike the sheep’s legs to keep it from going off a cliff or into a dangerous place. If a predator comes near, the shephered can use the staff to fend off the predator so that the sheep won’t be harmed. This is the idea of discipline in these proverbs: in love we correct, rebuke, and protect our children. This is the way God disciplines us. 

We’re called to lead our children in following Jesus. As we lead, we’re an example of what it means to be a man or a woman for them. We don’t simply talk to them about God; we demonstrate a life lived close to God in repentance and faith. When we fail, we point to Jesus as the perfect Son, the true humanity.