In a study released recently by the Barna Research Group (May 6, 2003, www.barna.org), it was found that nearly nine out of ten parents of children less than thirteen years old (85%) feel that they are the ones primarily responsible for teaching their children about religious beliefs. That's a good thing! But that's not all; even though they may feel responsible, related research showed that most parents don't spend any time at all during a typical week talking about or studying religious subjects. Rather, the institute found that parents generally rely upon their church to give all of the religious teaching their children get. So, even though they may feel responsible for teaching their child about God, yet they ignore those feelings and ask someone else to do it for them!
In the Bible, we don't find the idea of letting someone else teach your child about God. The responsibility these parents felt is real-as we read in Eph 6:4, God expects the child's father to "bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord." The father, then, has the primary responsibility to teach the child about God. He is the one that is to teach the truth of Scripture, and help prepare the child for a life of the service of the Almighty. At times, though, that won't occur. What if the father doesn't want to spend the time to work with his son or daughter, and so shirks that responsibility? Worse yet, what if he doesn't even believe in God?
Look at the example of Timothy, in the New Testament. In Acts 16:1 we find that as a young boy, apparently he was in that situation. He was "the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer, but his father was a Greek." It seems that his father did not serve the God of Heaven. And yet, when Paul met him, he was a Christian, and sincere in his faith. Why was that? How did it come to be that he had a sincere faith, if his father had no interest in religion? Well, we know that, according to 2 Tim 3:14, that "from childhood [he had] known the sacred writings"-the Hebrew scriptures. Who taught him? Evidently, his mother! Paul wrote of it in a letter to the young man himself, in 2 Tim 1:5, saying, "I am mindful of the sincere faith within you, which first dwelt in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am sure that it is in you as well." Paul recognized the faith instilled through teaching that had been passed down from Timothy's grandmother, to his mother, and finally, to him as well. Even if the father for some reason, whether because he is unable or unwilling, decides that he will ignore his duty to teach his children about God, the mother is not excused from her responsibility to implant the fear and love of God within them.
In Prov 22:6 we read: "Train up a child in the way he should go, Even when he is old he will not depart from it." As a general rule, if our children are faithfully taught the truth of God, they will come to serve Him as well-and scripturally, it is the parents that bear that responsibility.
We can see a definite pattern in the Old Testament as to how this is to be-a pattern that we, as parents ought to follow. Long ago, God spoke of Abraham, saying in Gen 18:19, "For I have chosen him, so that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing righteousness and justice, so that the LORD may bring upon Abraham what He has spoken about him." God expected Abraham to keep His way-but not only that: he was to command his children and household to do the same. God expects no less from us.
Now, it was through Abraham's descendants that the nation of Israel would come, and ultimately, the Christ-so it was important that they remain faithful throughout their generations. That is why Moses, when repeating the laws in Deut 6:6,7, said, "These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your sons 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 up." The phrase "teach them diligently" comes from a word that means, "to repeat, iterate, or do a thing again and again" (Clarke's Commentary) and so it gives the idea of sharpening a tool by repeatedly grinding it. You may have seen someone sharpen a knife on a whetstone; that's the idea with teaching our children diligently. It's not a one time shot; it's a repeated effort, over and over trying to instill God's truths. A knife doesn't become razor sharp with one pass on the whetstone; neither is our responsibility in teaching our children completed overnight.
We should also notice when the Israelites were to instruct their children. They were to teach when they sat in the house (not just when meeting with the church), when they walked by the way (when travelling, as well as at home), when they lay down, and when they rose up (both the last and the first thoughts of the day). Teaching and speaking about God was to be an integral part of their lives-it wasn't something that could be picked up or put down, like a coat. We can't live dual lives in which we think and live spiritually on Sunday, but behave in far different ways through the rest of the week, and still expect our children to come to know God.
Of course, our children should see us worship God. In Ex 12:26,27, after Moses had described for the first time to the Hebrew elders how they were to keep the Passover feast, he then said, "when your children say to you, 'What does this rite mean to you?' you shall say, 'It is a Passover sacrifice to the LORD who passed over the houses of the sons of Israel in Egypt when He smote the Egyptians, but spared our homes.'" The Israelite children would see their parents worshiping God in the ways He commanded. Interestingly, it was expected that they would also have questions about why they were worshiping the way they did. But, not only that, they were to have a reasonable answer to give the child. We should be able to do the same; we must be able to give a good answer as to why we worship in the way we do, and if we cannot, then we need to study it out ourselves to see if we really should be worshiping in that way.
But again, not only should they see us obey God in worship, but throughout our lives. In Joshua chapter six, when the Israelites crossed the river Jordan to begin the conquest of Canaan, God miraculously held back the waters so that they would cross on dry land. He then commanded them to take twelve stones from the riverbed which would be set up at their first encampment in the land of Canaan. In verses 6 and 7 Joshua said, "Let this be a sign among you, so that when your children ask later, saying, 'What do these stones mean to you?' then you shall say to them, 'Because the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD; when it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off.' So these stones shall become a memorial to the sons of Israel forever." In a similar way, our children should see evidence of our beliefs ever present in our lives. Like the memorial of stones, our children should see marks of our service and devotion to God throughout our lives-not just on particular days.
Yes, we must teach our children about the truths of Gods word; if we don't, there are grave consequences. The writer of Psalm 78 expressed the necessity for teaching when he wrote about the things they had heard from their fathers, beginning in verse four: "We will not conceal them from their children, But tell to the generation to come the praises of the LORD, And His strength and His wondrous works that He has done. For He established a testimony in Jacob And appointed a law in Israel, Which He commanded our fathers That they should teach them to their children, That the generation to come might know, even the children yet to be born, That they may arise and tell them to their children, That they should put their confidence in God And not forget the works of God, But keep His commandments."
If we do not teach our children about God, it is quite possible that they will never come to know Him. We cannot keep silent, and expect them to learn anything. If we neglect the charge given us to bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord, what we can expect is that they will be very much like the generation that came after Joshua's. In Judges chapter two, we read about them: in verse 7, "The people served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who survived Joshua, who had seen all the great work of the LORD which He had done for Israel." Then in verse 10, "All that generation also were gathered to their fathers; and there arose another generation after them who did not know the LORD, nor yet the work which He had done for Israel. Then the sons of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals, and they forsook the LORD, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods from among the gods of the peoples who were around them, and bowed themselves down to them; thus they provoked the LORD to anger." All this didn't take very long; it has been said that it had been no more than sixty-seven years from their coming out of Egypt to this (Ben Gersom, quoted by Gill). All it took was for one generation to leave another untaught.
Moses declared to the Israelites in Deut 29:29, "The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our sons forever, that we may observe all the words of this law." Friends, the things that God has revealed to us we have no right to keep to ourselves-we must teach them to our children as well. Almost 400 years ago, John Donne (1624) said, "No man is an island, entire of itself" No man lives simply to himself-he will have an influence on society as well. Nowhere will we have a more profound influence than in the lives of our children. Jesus has said in Mt 25 that at least in part we will be judged on how we care for others in simple ways-whether feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, invite the stranger in, clothe the naked, visit the sick or imprisoned. If we bear guilt for having neglected these simple physical needs of those around us, how shall we escape the judgement of God for neglecting the spiritual upbringing of our own children? (Clarke's Commentary)
But it doesn't have to be that way; we can start, like David did in Psa 34:11, by saying, "Come, you children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the LORD."
