1. Introduction Proverbs and Other Texts

2.  Training Your Child to Obey  Dealing with Rebellion  Training in Righteousness  Aiming for the Heart

3.  Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it. (Proverbs 22:6)  J. Richard Fugate points out that as a parent, you are always training your child, even if you are not teaching him “in the way he should go” (according to God’s standards). * J. Richard Fugate, What the Bible Says About Child Training

4.  Even if parents simply do nothing, their child is being trained by them to think that whatever he wants to do is alright.  So if your child is rude, inconsiderate, and selfish, you have, in effect, trained him to be that way by not training him to the contrary.  Likewise, if your child is lazy and sloppy and disrespectful and a troublemaker; you have trained him to be that way.  It is very easy to train your child in these undesirable behavior patterns because they agree with his natural inclinations.

5.  Fugate then shows that sometimes, even parents who attempt to instruct their child in good behavior, end up unintentionally training their child to disobey them by the way they allow their child to react to their instructions.

6.  A child can be trained that obedience is required only after instructions have been repeated a second or third time. If a child is able to get away with ignoring the first command, he will attempt to ignore even repeated commands. He has probably experienced parents forgetting after several repeats and can look forward to possibly escaping the task altogether.  A child can be trained that obedience is required only after an implied threat (a raised voice) or an explicit threat of punishment. * Gleaned from J. Richard Fugate, What the Bible Says About Child Training

7.  A child can be trained to completely ignore instructions even if repeated or accompanied by threats.  When a parent threatens a child to “do it or else” and the “or else” seldom happens the child is being trained that the parent’s word has no value. And by extension, such a child will also begin to doubt the word of other authorities – even the word of God.  If follow-through is inconsistent, a child will make a game out of disobeying, gambling that he will get away with it.

8.  A child can train his parents to wait until he decides when to obey. This behavior is not obedience, but a subtle form of rebellion most often practiced by little girls (and a lot of older girls who learned its success).  When you tell your daughter to do something and she responds by saying, “Just a minute”, you are being trained to wait until her timing. The child has just said, “I will do your will when it becomes my will.”  Or you may tell her to do something and she sweetly says, “Okay, Mommy” and then proceeds to wait thirty minutes.  Or she may wait until you ask her again and say, “I was just on my way.”  In each case it is the child, not the parent that is in control.

9.  A child can be trained to question or argue about every instruction that you give him.  Parents do not owe their child an explanation for their instructions. He does not have to know why you want him to do it, let alone agree with you. You are his authority and thereby have the right to direct his activities.  When a child is allowed to talk back or argue, he makes his parents pay a penalty for interfering with his life. If he makes the price high enough in unpleasantness, his parents may get off his back.

10.  When we allow a child to get away with incremental disobedience (disobeying in small steps) we are training him that it’s okay to disobey – as long as you don’t do it all at once. Here is an example of how this can work:  A parent puts the child down for bed and goes downstairs.  Pretty soon the child tip toes downstairs where he is told to go back to bed.  Instead he smiles sweetly and moves into the room for a hug.  The parent then tells the child he may stay if he sits down and remains quiet.

11.  If a child fails to do something that he is supposed to do and then we try to bribe him or make things easier on him in order to get him to do it, we are, in effect, rewarding him for his disobedience.  For example, a Mom calls her two-year-old and the child ignores her or takes off running in the other direction. So the Mom says, “Come to Mommy and I’ll give you a piece of candy.”  Mom tells Johnny to clean up his room. Instead, Johnny dawdles around, so Mom offers to help or, worse yet, does it for him.