A WORD TO THE WISE. Proverbs 29: 15. "What Do You Call It?"

Proverbs 29: 15     The rod and rebuke give wisdom, but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother.

Proverbs 29: 15.  If my son got sick and I didn’t take him to the doctor, or get him medicine, or do anything to comfort and care for him with whatever resources I have, then you’d cry, “Neglect.”  If left to himself my child drank what looked like medicine but was in fact poison, you’d condemn me for abuse or even a degree of murder; and you’d be right.

If I ate every day before I came home but my daughter was malnourished, and I never brought or prepared anything for her to eat, you’d call it neglect.  If left to herself she tried to cook a rotten, maggoty piece of meat and it made her too sick to get out of the house that was burning down from the grease fire she started because I never taught her to use a stove----- you’d call me a horrible parent and cry that I was responsible for the tragedy; and you’d be right.

We and our children live in a spiritually sick society.  Day after day media, peers, and unclean spiritual forces do all they can to infect our children. 

What should we call it, when parents ignores the symptoms of a child with a  sin-sick soul? 

What should we call it when parents offer no spiritual balm to the child who is feverish from the attacks of enemies trying to destroy him/her from the inside?

What words are appropriate or the “Christian” parent who says, “I don’t want to tell my children what to believe,” and so leaves his/her children unguided to drink whatever poison on world’s shelf looks like maybe it will ease their souls’ pain?

Isn’t that also NEGLECT?

Isn’t that also CHILD ABUSE?

We and our children live in a morally rotten world.  Our babies are hungry for truth.  They are starved for something real in this world of costumes and contrivances. 

So what is the correct description of parents who know this hunger from their own lives but who does nothing to give nourishing truth to the minds and hearts of their children?

What are the right terms for parents who leave their children to consume whatever filth and rottenness the culture leaves behind?

What is it when parents never teach their children how to process the garbage that media, human predators, and the devil’s forces want to feed them?

It is MORAL NEGLECT.  It is SPIRITUAL CHILD ABUSE.  It’s contributing to the delinquency of a generation; and parents are guilty.

No parents want to believe that “My children are that bad,” but they are.

No parents wants to think “It’s my fault,” but it is.

Yes, children have their own minds and they choose for themselves what to do; but children only choose from the options that their parents make available.  They don’t eat at home if we don’t bring groceries home.

They don’t read if we don’t bring home books.

They don’t get better if we don’t get them medicine and medical care.

They don’t live godly if we don’t bring prayer and the Bible and an example of godliness home with us.

If we don’t what we should do, then when they do wrong we are also guilty, and we ought to be ashamed.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a pastor, writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Call me at 334-288-0577
Email me at atgravestwo2@aol.com
Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

To hear sermons, read devotions, and learn more about the ministry at Hall Memorial CME Church, visit www.hallmemorialcme@blogspotcom.