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Paul's word to fathers in Ephesians 6:4 is twelve words in the English Bible. But the weight of those twelve words could fill a lifetime.

"Bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord."

Two Greek words carry this mandate. Paideia — translated "training" — refers to discipline: the shaping of character through correction, structure, and consequences. Nouthesia — translated "admonition" — refers to instruction: the teaching of truth through words, catechesis, and consistent conversation.

Both are necessary. Instruction without discipline produces children who know the right answers but live however they want. Discipline without instruction produces children who comply outwardly but never understand why — and who often walk away the moment they're free to.

And both must be of the Lord. The goal here is not raising polite, well-adjusted, productive members of society. The goal is raising disciples of Jesus Christ.

Scripture is bracingly direct about parental discipline. Proverbs 13:24 says, "He who spares his rod hates his son, but he who loves him disciplines him promptly." Proverbs 29:15 adds, "The rod and rebuke give wisdom, but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother." A child without structure isn't being given freedom. He's being abandoned.

But Paul's command contains a warning alongside the mandate: "Do not provoke your children to wrath." Colossians 3:21 sharpens it: "Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged."

How do fathers provoke their children? Inconsistency — rules that shift with Dad's mood. Hypocrisy — demanding what you don't model. Harshness — correction that is disproportionate or cruel. Coldness — discipline without visible affection. And neglect — the complete absence of any guidance at all. Children can endure strictness when it's wrapped in genuine love. What they cannot endure is injustice — and they have a finely tuned radar for it.

John Bunyan, writing in Christian Behaviour, gave counsel that still holds: correction must be given in cool blood, never in rage; with explanation of the offense; in conscience to God rather than personal irritation; aimed at the child's soul rather than just outward compliance; and concluded with prayer together. That last point is vital. Discipline without prayer is behavior modification. Discipline with prayer is soul care.

Beyond correction, there is catechesis — the daily, patient, ongoing teaching of the faith. Deuteronomy 6:6–7 describes it as whole-life, integrated discipleship: "You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up."

This is not Sunday school plus youth group and call it done. It is the faith woven into the fabric of ordinary life. The question is not whether you are teaching your children — you always are. The question is what.

When you are driving to practice and the song on the radio raises a question — you are teaching. When conflict arises at dinner and you handle it with grace or with anger — you are teaching. When tragedy strikes and your children watch how you respond — you are teaching. The only variable is whether the lesson is intentional.

The Puritans took this seriously enough to structure their days around it. A.W. Pink wrote that "at least twice each day the whole household should be gathered together to bow before the Lord — parents and children — to confess their sins, to give thanks for God's mercies, to seek His help and blessing. Nothing must be allowed to interfere with this duty: all other domestic arrangements are to bend to it."

That may sound radical. But consider the math. The church gathers once or twice a week. Your family gathers every single day. Where does the primary work of discipleship happen?

And then there is Psalm 78 — perhaps the most expansive vision for what faithful parenting produces:

"We will not hide them from their children, telling to the generation to come the praises of the LORD... that they may arise and declare them to their children, that they may set their hope in God."

Do you see the chain? Fathers tell children. Children tell their children. And the generation not yet born arises and sets its hope in God.

You are not simply parenting the child in front of you. You are shaping grandchildren you may never meet. Great-grandchildren who will stand before God's throne for eternity, whose relationship with Him — or estrangement from Him — will be influenced, in ways impossible to fully trace, by what you do in your home this week.

That is not pressure meant to crush you. It is vision meant to awaken you.

The call is not perfection. You will lose your temper. You will miss opportunities. You will sometimes discipline in anger and instruct from exhaustion. But the same God who commands faithful parenting also supplies grace to parents who confess their failures and return to the work.

Confess. Receive grace. Get back to it.

Because the children who will come — and their children after them — are watching what you do with your one shot at this.