Reflections on Proverbs 22:6

 

 

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it. From KJV.

I had someone give me the thought this morning that this may not mean what most of us think it means. On the surface, it looks like "There is a specific way to raise your kids that guarantees they will stick to those ways all their lives". Except then parents all over the world bemoan their misfortunes as they watch their kids stray from their upbringings. "We trained them as trained as we knew how to. How was it not enough?"

Here's the thing. I don't think that's what Solomon meant.

The individual who spoke to me this morning suggested that Proverbs 22:6 is saying "Train a child according to his inclinations/personality/interests and when he is old he will still be doing these things with excellent success."

Which is entirely valid. Maybe you want your child to be good at math and become a rocket scientist. But maybe they have no inclinations for math. Maybe their talent is art.

You know how a fish will look stupid if intelligence is measured by ability to climb trees? It's kinda like that. You have to train a monkey like a monkey and train a fish like a fish. Grow an olive tree like an olive tree, and a grapevine like a grapevine.

And I completely agree with this individual's reasoning. But I think that while the verse may have more than one correct interpretation, Solomon's actual intent was probably a warning of how to NOT raise your kids.

By the definitions of Strong's Concordance, "Dedicate/commit a child in the way/after the manner of his mouth/speech, and when he is old he will not turn from it."

"Raise a kid the way he wants to be raised, do what he says, and when he grows up, he will forever be a spoiled arrogant brat."

Just look at the vast majority of humanity these days, with spoiled, entitled brats in every direction. They were never corrected in childhood, so now they're permanently stuck in their self-important ways.

Solomon would've had first hand observation of this. His father, King David, had many wives and many children. But likely busy with running a kingdom, fighting wars, and running a nation, he probably left his own family largely to their own devices. And so one of his sons raped one of his daughters. There were family feuds.Several of his children ended up dead, two at the hands of siblings, one at the hand of a cousin. And that's just the bits that we know about. David's family was a wreck, because he let his children follow their own folly.

If you train a child in the paths of righteousness, it isn't guaranteed that he will stay in those paths. The chance exists that he could still stray. But if you just sit and do nothing at all, it guarantees he will grow up in folly.

NOW...

With that being said, I'd also like to clarify I'm not advocating for the way some people twist "spare the rod, spoil the child". I don't adhere to the idea of spanking a child into submission.

There ARE times it's called for. There are times when punishing a child with physical pain is appropriate in order to save them from something even worse. For example, if a kid is reaching for a hot stove, you may not have the time to do anything except slapping their hand away very painfully, recognizing that the sting of the slap is going to be less damaging than a second-degree burn.

And there are also times when punishment is not the right response. Sometimes, instead of punishing an undesirable behavior, it works better to gently replace it with a new behavior.

If a kid is digging holes all over the yard (uncontrolled destructive), then it may be appropriate to say "okay, you can do that, but only in a specific area that I will designate" (controlled destruction). Or, you might be able to steer the kid out of digging holes for no reason and into planting a garden (constructive).

Training/correcting/disciplining/raising is a very subjective thing. Different kids need different tactics for different things, and there is no hard and fast rule. Well...there is one. Found in Ephesians 6:4 and again in Colossians 3:21. Fathers, don't provoke your children to anger, lest you dishearten/dismay them. But rather nurture them with the education and mild rebukes of the Lord.

In other words, when you correct your child, whether its a punishment like spanking or time out, whether its a scolding, whether its replacing one behavior with another, DON"T DO IT IN ANGER, because the Bible warns us time and time again of the irreversible damage that anger can do.

In summary:

1. Lead a child in righteous paths in a way that can also help him explore and grow his strengths/inclinations/talents/interests.

2. While raising him, correct a child's foolish behaviors, lest he grow up with them. An apple tree needs raised like an apple tree, but part of raising it well also requires skillful pruning lest it grow wild and not bear good fruit.

3. Not all correction requires a rod, not all correction requires a punishment of any form, and regardless what form of correction is used, never should it involve anger. Anger is reserved for the willful enemies of God, not for your family.