Digging For Truth

               p a r e n t a l    a u t h o r i t y            (  3  RELATED  PHRASES  )                

  How few there are in our day who follow this example! On the part of too many parents there is a blind and selfish sentimentalism, miscalled love, which is manifested in leaving children, with their unformed judgment and undisciplined passions, to the control of their own will. This is the veriest cruelty to the youth and a great wrong to the world. Parental indulgence causes disorder in families and in society. It confirms in the young the desire to follow inclination, instead of submitting to the divine requirements. Thus they grow up with a heart averse to doing God's will, and they transmit their irreligious, insubordinate spirit to their children and children's children. Like Abraham, parents should command their households after them. Let obedience to parental authority be taught and enforced as the first step in obedience to the authority of God.  {PP 142.4}  {RH, April 21, 1904 par. 19}

  Obedience to parental authority should be inculcated in babyhood and cultivated in youth.  Some parents think that they can let their little ones have their own way in their babyhood, and then when they get older, they will reason with them; but this is a mistake. Begin in the baby life to teach obedience. . . . Require obedience in your home school.  {CG 82.2}

  Anciently, parental authority was regarded; children were then in subjection to their parents and feared and reverenced them; but in these last days the order is reversed. Some parents are in subjection to their children. They fear to cross the will of their children, and therefore yield to them. But just as long as children are under the roof of the parents, dependent upon them, they should be subject to their control. Parents should move with decision, requiring that their views of right be followed out.  {CG 240.2}

  Parents should never lose sight of their own responsibility for the future happiness of their children. Isaac's deference to his father's judgment was the result of the training that had taught him to love a life of obedience. While Abraham required his children to respect parental authority, his daily life testified that that authority was not a selfish or arbitrary control, but was founded in love, and had their welfare and happiness in view.  {CE 229.1}

  Brother and Sister E have not regarded the directions of God's word in the training of their children. These children have been allowed to control at home to a very great degree and have come and gone as they pleased. Unless they are placed under entirely different influences they will be found in the enemy's ranks, warring against order, discipline, and subordination. Children thus left to have their own way are not happy; and where parental authority is lightly regarded, the authority of God will not be respected.  {5T 305.1}

  In this age we are pained to see that children and youth look upon themselves as too far advanced to submit themselves to the control of their parents. When they reach the age of ten or twelve, they seem to imagine that to yield to parental authority would be an evidence of weakness, a sacrifice of their rightful independence. But instead of being capable of governing themselves, they are vacillating and weak in purpose. Their moral powers are feeble, and they have but little spiritual power. The reason why they are thus weak and easily led away by temptation, is that they do not imitate the life of Christ. They get above the simplicity of Jesus.  {YI, July 14, 1892 par. 1}

  Those who have too little courage to reprove wrong, or who through indolence or lack of interest make no earnest effort to purify the family or the church of God, are held accountable for the evil that may result from their neglect of duty. We are just as responsible for evils that we might have checked in others by exercise of parental or pastoral authority, as if the acts had been our own.  {CG 235.4}

  If parents allow their children to receive an education with the world, and make the Sabbath a common day, then the seal of God cannot be placed upon them. They will be destroyed with the world; and will not their blood rest upon the parents? But if we faithfully teach our children God's commandments, bring them into subjection to parental authority, and then by faith and prayer commit them to God, he will work with our efforts; for he has promised it. And when the overflowing scourge shall pass through the land, they with us may be hidden in the secret of the Lord's pavilion.  {HS 217.2}