I am indebted to Tedd Tripp, Shepherding a child’s heart, Shepherd Press, 1995. These studies are a review of the good material in this book. After the presentation last Sunday, someone asked me what is meant specifically by "shepherding a child’s heart." Here is the explanation given by Tedd Tripp:

"I have used the phrase ‘shepherding the heart’ to embody the process of guiding our children. It means helping them understand themselves, God’s works, the ways of God, how sin works in the human heart, and how the gospel comes to them at the most profound levels of human need. Shepherding the hearts of children also involves helping them understand their motivations, goals, wants, wishes and desires. It exposes the true nature of reality and encourages faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. You undertake the shepherding process through the kind of rich, multifaceted communication that I have sketched here." (Shepherding, 94.)

Last Sunday, the message emphasized the need for parents to look beyond the behavior and to see the condition of the heart. We should not seek to just correct unacceptable behavior, but especially to guide, condition and change the heart. There is something wrong, seriously wrong, with every heart. (Jeremiah 17:9, Proverbs 22:15.) If we fail to accept that, to know the truth of it, even in our sweet little children, we will fail in our efforts to shepherd their hearts. To properly shepherd their hearts, we must know something about the heart of man. We also noted that external pressures alone cannot force a child to go the way he should. It is the set of the sails and not the gales which tells the way the ship will go. Another important point from last week is that both the potter and the clay (to use another analogy) play a significant role in the kind of vessel produced. It does not depend only upon the potter (the parent) or upon the clay (the child). It depends upon the condition of the heart; therefore, early lessons that the child learns are significant.

Parents often want a short cut, an easy solution, to the parenting process. Some religious parents are waiting for a quick "conversion experience" to change their children. Some want so much for their children to be immersed. I want to encourage you to be a long distance runner. Shepherding the heart of a child is a long process. It must begin long before the child is baptized (saved), and it must continue after the child is immersed. Going off to a summer camp, or going to a Christian college alone, is not likely to immediately change the heart. Don’t wait on someone else to do this work for you. Bible class teachers can help, but the primary responsibility is the parents.

We learn our methods of parenting from a lot of sources; some of them are not so reliable. We are all heavily influenced by what our parents did and what we see others doing. A lot of advice is given in various magazines. Some make their living addressing parenting issues because most parents are intensely interested in such. Television talk programs bring on their experts. These may or may not be good methods, especially biblically oriented methods that have the goal of reaching the heart. We want to be sure that our methods come from Scripture.

We cannot depend upon the experts when it comes to telling us about human nature and the heart of man. We must allow God to tell us, or we will never be sure. If the Bible says that man is a pretty good creature that needs little discipline, then so be it. If the Bible says that man has a deceitful heart that is desperately wicked (Jer. 17:9), then we must proceed with that foundation. When Jesus worked miracles in Jerusalem, he would not commit himself to man because he knew all men. "He needed not that any should testify about man because he knew what was in man." (John 2:24-25.)

A little of everything (Erratic Eclecticism). Some parents try a little of whatever they have seen or heard from others. There is no consistency or understanding of the long-term effects of such parenting. They try yelling, emotionalism, time-out, grounding. spanking, threatening, pop psychology, bribery, contracts, bullying, etc. The parents and children are confused.

All parents should evaluate their parenting methods and discard unbiblical methods. Superficial parenting that deals mostly with behavior instead of the heart should be rejected with a more genuine approach which deals with the attitudes of the heart. Churches can fail miserably in this way as well. For example, if what we emphasize are primarily the right forms instead of the heart, we will produce people who think of Christianity mostly in terms of outward behavior. They attend the services while hating their brothers and sisters in Christ. They do the right things while their hearts are far from God. Jesus said, You honor me with your lips, but your hearts are far from me. (Matthew 15:8.) One preacher said that you can be straight as a double-barreled shotgun in doctrine and just as empty. Jesus said that the Pharisees were like a whited sepulcher. A sepulcher looks good on the outside, but inside are dead men’s bones. Parenting that deals with symptoms and not the disease is not genuine parenting.

Anything that is abusive. Parents do not have the right to be mean, harsh, or cruel to their children. Christian parents should know better than physically abuse their children. (I do not mean here spanking. . . more later on this.) Neither should we verbally abuse our children. We should practice the Golden Rule with our children, just as we would with other people. Children are people deserving of respect too.

Refusal to teach children about God. Of course, parents who do not know God or have convictions about the faith of the Gospel cannot teach their children about God. God commands parents to teach their children about Him. God said this about Abraham:

"For I know him that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgement." (Genesis 18:19.)

The Law of Moses taught: "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart and with all thy soul and with all thy might. Thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. Thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand and they shall be frontlets between thine eyes. Thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house and on thy gates." (Deut. 6:4-9.)

The New Testament teaches parents: "Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. . . And ye fathers provoke not your children to wrath, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." (Eph. 6:1-4.)

What cruelty for parents who know the value of vaccines to refuse to have their children vaccinated against childhood diseases. What negligence for parents to not demand that their children go to school. It is, in fact, against the law of the land. It is a greater cruelty and negligence of children to allow them to grow up and not be taught about God. This is not an optional matter. Your obedience to God as parents is at stake.

Emotional privation. A seven-year old girl was once punished by making her sit alone in a chair in the middle of the living room. The rule was that no one could talk to the child during this period of punishment. The parents had decided against spanking, but they would make her sit alone without any communication. This little girl said that the saddest thing in her life was when she was made to sit in the chair. Her daddy was home, but he would not talk to her.

This approach is not only cruel, but also very ineffective in addressing the heart biblically. This little girl is not learning to understand her misbehavior biblically. She is not learning to discern the specific issues of the heart that her behavior reflects. What she is learning is to avoid the emotional privation of being in the chair. She is being trained to respond to the crippling fear of emotional privation. She may internally distance herself from her parents to avoid further hurt. She is not learning how to love others openly or to communicate. She may withdraw her feelings and become a compliant person. Whether compliant or rebellious, her heart is not being shepherded in a good way.

One little boy was being punished by being sent to his room. He said, "It’s not too bad. I can play and watch TV in my room. If I don’t let it bother me, it isn’t that bad." (Shepherding, 67.) The problem with these methods is that the child is given the silent treatment. It is emotional privation. It does not address what the child did wrong or why. It would have been much better if the child was deprived of his expensive toys, like the TV, than to be deprived emotionally.

One writer advocated "kicking your kids out of Eden" when they misbehave. He recommended this only when the discipline problem was major and the child had resisted all corrective or remedial efforts. He meant this: Strip the child’s room of all possessions except furniture, essential clothing and necessary school supplies. In addition, withdraw the child from all after-school activities, put on hold all non-essential purchases, and cancel all privileges indefinitely. Then, tell the child (an older child) that when he or she has solved the problem in question, you will begin restoring the possessions one at a time, slowly. If the bad behavior returns, then go back to the essentials. This teaches a child that there are consequences to bad behavior. The child must understand what you are doing and why. I like the above approach as long as it does not include emotional privation.

Inconsistency. It is not fair to the children to be inconsistent with corrective measures. The child needs to know that Mom and Dad are going to be the same every day. There is inconsistency if the Mom says yes and Dad says no, about things that matter. Treat all the children alike. Remember Jacob and Joseph? Consistency and security go together.

One common expression of inconsistency is threatening without following through. Some parents constantly threaten their children with punishment for bad behavior. Most of the time they do nothing about it. Then, when their patience runs out, they strike without warning. They lied most of the time before, but now they act. A child cannot learn how to respond to you as an adult if you are not consistent. There is nothing worse than a parent who constantly yells at a child with threats and allows the child to continue with bad behavior. It is like thundering without it ever raining.

To support your children in wrong doing. The worse position for a parent to be found in is one that knowingly supports wrongdoing by a child. The parent does not let the child know that the action or behavior is against the will of God. If the parents do not stand firmly against the behavior, then they become accomplices in the wrongdoing. Christian parents must know the will of God and then exercise the authority God has given you as parents. If you do not, then you will answer to God for your sins as a parent.

Here are some examples. Suppose you find out that your child is planning on cheating on an exam instead of studying for it. Instead of trying to correct a serious heart problem, the parent actually encourages the child to go ahead with his plans. The parents have sinned against the child and against God. Suppose parents know that their teenager is dating and the two dating are already living together sexually. Instead of addressing this serious issue, the parents make jokes about it and give tacit approval to this behavior. Suppose you know that your child in middle school is using drugs. The parents know it and do nothing about it. If you do not restrain your children, you will destroy them and you will share in the blame before God. Eli failed to restrain his sons when he knew of their sins. (1 Samuel 3:13.)

There are at least two ways of being guilty of sin in Scripture. One direct way is to commit acts of disobedience against God yourself. Another way is to encourage, assist, take pleasure in the wrongs that others do. Paul wrote that both persons are "worthy of death." (Rom. 1:32.) If you do not lift up your voice against wrong wherever it is found, you become an accomplice. Wickedness and weakness are both wrong before God. Many are not openly wicked in their lives, but they are very weak spiritually and will not take a stand against wrong doing.