The parental imperative to teach …

Massive audiences tuned in to the recent NBA finals, with much of the talk surrounding how incredible of a player LeBron James is. It didn’t take long, though, for the comparisons to begin … who’s better than LeBron?

Much of that talk landed on Michael Jordan.

What do you suppose basketball great Michael Jordan would say was the luckiest thing that every happened to him? Being born with the genes of an athletic superhero? Being drafted by the Chicago Bulls? Winning six (yes, six!) NBA championship titles? If you answered any of these you’d be very much wrong.

Jordan spoke to his good fortune saying …

“My heroes are and were my parents. You can’t really depend on other people for guidance … for setting an example you can see every day … If you’re lucky you grow up in a house where you can learn what kind of person you should be from your parents. And on that count I was very lucky. It may have been the luckiest thing that ever happened to me.”

It isn’t God’s plan that some people “luck out” getting parents who are great examples for them, it’s actually God’s design that parents be the primary teachers to their own children, with a focus and commitment on teaching their children about God and leading them into a covenant relationship with Him for a life of faith and commitment to our Creator. Psalm 78 is a powerful reminder of God’s design for the parental imperative of teaching your children …

O my people, listen to my instructions. Open your ears to what I am saying, for I will speak to you in a parable. I will teach you hidden lessons from our past — stories we have heard and known, stories our ancestors handed down to us. We will not hide these truths from our children; we will tell the next generation about the glorious deeds of the Lord, about his power and his mighty wonders. For he issued his laws to Jacob; he gave his instructions to Israel. He commanded our ancestors to teach them to their children, so the next generation might know them — even the children not yet born — and they in turn will teach their own children. So each generation should set its hope anew on God, not forgetting his glorious miracles and obeying his commands. – Psalm 78:1-7.

Much of the remainder of Psalm 78 is the telling of the terrible consequences that happen when parents are not faithful to their parental imperative to teach their children.

Even today, parents are prone to pass off the teaching of their children to public or privates schools, Sunday school teachers and pastors, coaches, and others and failing to be the primary teacher to the children in their own homes. Some argue children shouldn’t be provided spiritual instruction but such teaching should come later when children are old enough to decide for themselves what they want to believe. There’s great fault to be found in such reasoning, and scripture warns that will lead to tragic results.

The poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge once had a discussion with a man who argued that children should not be given any religious training, but should be free to choose their own faith when they were old enough to decide for themselves. Coleridge later invited him into his garden. It seems our Mr Coleridge was a great poet but not a great gardener.

“Do you call this a garden?” the visitor asked. “There are nothing but weeds here!”

“Well, you see,” Coleridge replied, “I did not wish to infringe upon the liberty of the garden in any way. I was just giving the garden a chance to express itself.”

Are your children, like Michael Jordan, blessed with parents who are great examples for them? Is your life a model of faith, trust, and obedience to God for your children? Are you teaching your children about God so that they will set their “… hope anew on God, not forgetting his glorious miracles and obeying his commands”?

Scotty