And fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord (Ephesians 6:4).
The positive responsibility and the duty required of parents—primarily the father—is to “bring them up”, the identical Greek word translated “nourish” in Ephesians 5:29. Parents ought to nourish their children broadly, more than merely preparing their meals, providing whatever is needful for their life and growth, tenderly caring for them, nourishing them to maturity.
The duty to nourish andbring them up is represented in the Old Testament principle explained in Proverbs 22:6. “Train up a child in the way he should go. Even when he is old, he will not depart from it.”
The goal for parents in bringing them up is to nurture their child to maturity, where maturity is measured by their ability to live independently from the parents as responsible, godly adults. Parents ought to aim at the goal of mature children by bringing them in the way of the Lord that leads to life–rather than the way of the world and of sin that leads to death–by seeking to form their character, by directing them to submit to the authority of Christ, so that following Him they may become useful to men, may be prepared for the world to come, may give glory to God.
The parental responsibility to bring them up is exercised as a process, a process requiring constant, hands-on input and initiative of the parent, a progressive process of assisting the them to grow up by putting aside childish things, of helping them to develop independent judgment and behavior.
Christian parenting—bringing them up—is a process, a series of parental actions leading to continuous change over time, not like the quick push of the button on a microwave, expecting a breakfast of instant oatmeal in 3 minutes. Christian parenting is a process of the kind undertaken by a gardener wearing overalls and gloves on in a patch of uncultivated soil in full sun, a process approached, at times, on hands and knees, in gradual steps over years, in season and out of season, sometimes seeing no perceptible results, still tilling, watering, nurturing, adding amendments, removing stones, always weeding and watching for gophers, so that sprouted seeds grow to a sturdy plant, a process of patience and persistence despite drought and dormancy, a process yielding, eventually, an orchard heavy with fragrance and fruit. It is a process that requires wisdom, grace and personal intimacy in order to know who you are working with.
