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Gold, Silver, Precious Stones
P.O. Box 240
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1800 Circular Letter of the Kehukee (North Carolina) Association
Our duty to our family…appears very extensive when we consider ourselves, in respect to them, not only as stewards, who have to give account of our stewardship to God, but as it were, as prophets, priests and kings. As a prophet, we should teach and instruct them; as a priest we should pray with and for them, and should be careful in the order of their government. Each one to whom God has committed the care of souls, or a family, which is the same thing, should consider himself as their teacher, to whom all the family look, and from whom they all expect to receive their instruction, as it is well known that children in their tender years are naturally led to think the judgment, counsel, ways, and behavior of their parents to be superior to all others, especially when parents or rulers exercise a proper authority.
Every family should have one, and only one proper head, who should take the government thereof, and in all cases endeavor to rule with justice, having a particular regard for all about him, setting forth good examples, walking in the ways of godliness and true piety, praying with and for them oft: yea, we are exhorted to “pray without ceasing,” and in everything to give thanks. If we neglect public prayer, praise, and thanksgiving in our families, do we not leave them all to walk in the dark, as it were while we suffer our light to be hidden under the bushel of worldly cares, or under the bed of sloth, while we ourselves walk unworthy the Christian name.
A family should not be governed by passion; Justice should be tempered with judgment and mercy. In vain does the passionate, fractious, turbulent, and inconsiderate person, after being the cause of a whole day’s unhappiness and discontent in his family, at night, call on all, or any of them to join him in the worship of God, while every mind is filled with prejudice, every eye with evil, and every tongue ready to say, “physician, heal thyself,” or otherwise, “thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye.” Therefore every ruler of a family should always remember that example has the most powerful influence, without which all our admonition will, in all probability, prove ineffectual. |
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