PAINFUL PARENTING

“Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: for the LORD hath spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against Me – Isaiah 1:2.”

Pain, they say, is often part of life experiences. But not all kinds of pain are expected to be taken as normal or acceptable. We have bodily pain which is caused as a result of fatigue, wound, sickness or disease. When men experience this kind of pain, it is often understandable. Much more than the bodily pain, what can we say about the emotional and spiritual pain? While we can debate on pain as being necessary or not, there is an injunction for us in the word of God that –

“…neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away – Rev. 21:4.”
So, we see here that the Scripture acknowledges the presence of pain but in the beginning, it was not so. Hence, the reason for its removal in the world to come. Aren't you looking forward to seeing that time when there would be no more pain?

Without digressing, one side of pain we are considering today is that of parenting. Many parents can testify and give their experiences about this side of their lives concerning their homes especially pertaining to their children. Many a parents had their hoary hairs brought to the early grave because of the nature and manner of the life of their children. Many children are source of pain and grieve to their parents as Esau was to Isaac and Rebecca. About this man, it was written that it was in his marriage he grieved his parents –

“And Esau was forty years old when he took to wife Judith the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Bashemath the daughter of Elon the Hittite: Which were a grief of mind unto Isaac and to Rebekah – Gen. 26:35.”

Judging from the pages of the Scriptures, many godly parents have had their share in this kind of painful experience. Who would have thought that men like Eli, David, Samuel, Asa would have sons and children that rebellious and obstinate? After all, we know the scripture says train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart. How about those children trained in that order yet they went astray? How grievous and painful that was for their parents! Whereas we know that there were some people who were not part of the household of faith, they were alienated from the commonwealth of Israel about whom we didn’t hear such things. Of a truth, there are some things that are not heard among the heathens which are said to be seen within the household of faith. For instance, we are told about the church at Corinth that some men were sleeping with their father’s wife. Isn’t that horrible? Children of disobedience. Children of belial.

Nevertheless, as painful and grievous the examples stated above seem to be as touching man to man, what shall we then say when it happens between man and God? As a matter of seriousness, that is the present case with this generation. My question to you this day, what has the Lord not done for you? Or rather, what has He done to you that would make you to behave contrary to Him? What? What good things has He withheld from you? What is it that you think God has not blessed you with that would have made you to be so stubborn and rebellious to Him?

What has the Lord taken from you? If you must be sincere, He has nothing to take from you but your sins. You have nothing to offer Him either because unto Him belongs all the cattle upon the thousand hills. This is the voice of God crying unto this generation thus -

“Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: for the LORD hath spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against Me.”

Sinners and Saints, bear this upon your mind that if His hand be upon you for evil, it is not because He is a wicked Father, it is because at one point in time you have been rebellious and stubborn. How could we have neglected so great a love which the Father has shown to us? What an insolent behaviour characterised by a stony and brazen heart we have when Christ Jesus came to die for our sins yet we would or bulge or repent? Would God that His Spirit continue to strive with men continually? See with what abundance of good things He surrounded us with. If you continue to disobey and grieve Him, you alone shall bear your reproach and His indignation. Therefore, make your Father in heaven happy today. Do all what you can to make our heavenly parent glad. Let it not be said, heard or told about us concerning our Father when He looks down on us again that –

“And it repented the LORD that He had made man on the earth, and it grieved Him at his heart – Gen. 6:6.”

 

REPENTANCE GREETINGS



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