ACC ~ Ephesians 6 v4b

TRACING THE MOTIVE OF OBEDIENCE BACK TO ITS SOURCE. CHRYSOSTOM: Then he explains the all-important thing about parenting: how children are to be brought to obedience. He traces the motive of obedience back to its source and fountain. He has already shown how the husband’s behavior elicits the wife’s obedience when he spoke primarily to the husband, advising him to draw her to him by the bonds of love. Similarly here also he shows how the parents’ behavior elicits the children’s obedience, saying, “Rear them in the instruction and discipline of the Lord.” Do you see how, when the spiritual motives are present, the physical effects will follow along? Do you want your son to be obedient? Rear him from the outset in the teaching and discipline of the Lord. Never regard it as a small matter that he should be a diligent learner of Scriptures. HOMILY ON EPHESIANS 21.6.4.

EDUCATE CHILDREN IN CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE. JEROME: Instead of asking parents to give their children a fancy education in secular literature, instead of making them read comedies and recite the obscene writings of the theater, he asks the Ephesian laypersons, many of whom, as is common in a population, were engaged in the ordinary occupations of this life, that they should “educate their children in every doctrine and counsel of the Lord.” Overseers and elders ought to take note of this. EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS 3.6.4.

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