Gospel Prism

When I served at a church in Chicago, there was a set of parents who believed that to be good parents meant allowing “kids to be kids.� That is, they never disciplined their child no matter what he did. And so he wreaked havoc wherever he went. As frustrated as our church staff felt about that child, the frustration was exponentially multiplied in thinking about the parents. After all, they were responsible to raise this child.

This type of unbiblical thinking has led many people to veer far away from the Lord. Sadly, parents train their children too often by the standards of the world rather than Scripture. They use Parents magazine or books by Dr. Sears more than they do the light of God’s Word. But this is no new phenomenon. There was an unbiblical parent in years past and his name was Eli, and this is what he did: he “honor[ed] your sons above me [God]� (1 Samuel 2:29). Or to put it another way, Eli worshipped his sons as his god rather than the Living God. Just how did he do this?

He allowed his sons to disobey God and His commands without any consequences. When Phinehas and Hophni were cheating people for their gain in the name of God (1 Samuel 2:12-17) and therefore treated the name of God with contempt as though God could not see their sins, Eli said to his sons, “No.� That’s it. He said, “No, my sons; it is no great report that I hear the people of the Lord spreading abroad.� (1 Samuel 2:24) This was supposed to be God’s priest, the one man who mediated between God and the people of Israel. In such a terrible thing as this brash and brazen effrontery to God, Eli said, “No.� And in this, his words were a cowardly approach to the sins of his children.

How often is the case that I hear parents simply say, “No� to their children? Saying “no� is not discipline for one’s actions. Usually it is an empty and toothless warning without even the remotest sense of discipline. It is the lazy way out of parenting, as saying, “No Johnny, stop hitting your sister,� is easier than actually having to communicate the depth of the child’s sin, mete out a just and fair punishment, listen to the child’s remorse, and then express your own love for that child. Saying “no� as a response to a child’s sin is easier, quicker, and completely ineffective in shaping a heart to love God and honor Him. If you’re trying to raise the most worldly person, then perhaps saying know is effective. But if you are trying to raise one who fears God and loves Him, then merely saying “no� is terribly inadequate.

Eli said “no� to his sons but that is all that he did. And in doing so, God tells Eli that he is worshipping them. He cares more about pleasing his sons, not wishing to bring them any discomfort, than he does about honoring his God. Eli was a God-fearing man at some level. After all, he was a priest. And yet, as a priest, he was blinded by the idea that his sons would somehow gain faith in God through osmosis. But that simply does not happen.

But instead we must heed the words of Deuteronomy 6:6-9:

These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 9 Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

Parents cannot take for granted that their faith will be absorbed by their children. Instead, like God commanded Israel as they were about to enter the Promised Land, we must IMPRESS God’s commands on them. Without this type of intentional training that keeps in mind discipline, not only will our children run amok, but we will be in danger of worshipping them as our god. Our children become the sole reason for our existence and they rule the way we think, act, and respond to them, not our Heavenly Father.

So what happened to Eli’s two sons. This is what God says in 1 Samuel 2:34: “” ‘And what happens to your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, will be a sign to you—they will both die on the same day.â€? That is not a good outcome for any parent. May our constant “No-ing,â€? turn into something much more profound. As Hebrews 12:7-8 teaches us about the necessity of discipline:

Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father? 8If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons.

So we parents have a choice, we can either treat our children like the sons and daughters who are true sons and daughters and not illegitimate children or we can treat them like our gods who we continually say “no� to without even nary a thought of discipline. The end result is catastrophic and tragic.