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Gold, Silver, Precious Stones
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in Messenger of Peace (July 1876)
I wish now to talk some to parents, and as a foundation for remarks, I will call your attention to Eph. vi chapter, 4th verse. “And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath; but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.” The Apostle is addressing believing parents, and after giving them instruction concerning many other things, (as the scriptures thoroughly furnish us unto every good work) he then draws the minds of the brethren to the subject of training their children. Now the question is, does he mean spiritual children, or fleshly children? I understand him to mean fleshly children, the bringing up of these children, I understand to be in a moral sense, no doubt fathers and mothers have conducted in such a way toward their children, that they have provoked them to wrath, that is, done things they would not have done, had they not been provoked.
Let us talk from a moral stand point, we should conduct toward our children in such a way as to make them believe that we have their good in view; all the time teaching them it is our duty to teach, and theirs to obey that teaching. The Apostle teaches us how we should not do toward our children, he then turns to the affirmative side of the subject, “but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.” Mark, he tells believing parents to do so; he does not tell you to put your children under the care of somebody else to bring them up for you, if God has brought you to a knowledge of his love, you are better qualified to bring up your own child than any one else is for you. Solomon says, “bring up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.”
Parents, have you ever thought of the responsibility resting upon you in regard to the training of your children? It might be said we cannot save our children in an eternal sense. This we well know, for none but Jesus can forgive sins. But, we are not talking about an eternal salvation, but a temporal salvation. We teach our children as soon as they can lisp words that it is wrong to lie. Why do we do this? Because God says so in his word; also, it is wrong to take the name of God in vain, and to steal, and so with all the commands of the moral law. It is true we can only teach them the letter of the moral law, not the spirituality of the law; that alone can be taught by the great teacher. We should be diligent in bringing up our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.—Ministers of the gospel in traveling over the country can easily tell, by the conduct of the children, whether they are brought up as required by the gospel. Our children will tell on us by their actions. (There is no doubt some exceptions.) |
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