Thorns and snares are in the way of the froward: he that does keep his soul shall be far from them.
The characters in real life are not always that different from those we find in children’s fictional stories. There are both “good guys” and “bad guys” in the true story that makes up our lives. In some sense, we are all by nature “bad guys,” but God’s redeeming grace restores us and renews every aspect of our broken-down lives. But there are still those who break things down. They ruin relationships. They trounce on churches and destroy families. They can even destroy entire economies.
But how would you recognize one of these “perverse” men should you run into one? When a couple of children work for hours building a castle out of blocks, a perverse child delights himself in kicking it over and stomping on it. He enjoys torturing animals or invading the privacy of others while they dress. As the froward child turns into a man, his perversity becomes more sophisticated. Following the example of the Marquis de Sade, he looks for the most heinous ways in which he might break the seventh commandment, “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” It would not be safe to live near this man, for the sorts of things he might do to our wives and children. In the business world, this man is consummately dishonest and uncooperative. The quicker you can identify these men and avoid them, the better for all around them.
To watch a close relative spiral into sexual rebellion, spousal abuse, divorce, loss of employment, and even criminal behavior, is often painful. Short of government welfare programs, these men would quickly die in a ditch somewhere, drunk and destitute. But the most important thing to realize about these froward men is that you cannot fix them, and neither can governments. They are cursed. Thankfully, God can fix them and sometimes He will fix them by the effectual preaching of the Word of God. But if these men and women refuse to hear the preaching and refuse to repent, then the warning still stands: keep your soul far from them!
Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.
A tiny kitten can make an impression on freshly-poured concrete, but even an elephant cannot make a mark on it once it is set. Like hardened concrete, old habits become hard to chip out, and the easiest lessons to learn are those you learn when you are young. Here is the reason why parenting is so crucial to a child’s future and to the future of an entire society. While it is possible to “teach an old dog new tricks,” it is much easier to work good character into the life of a child when he is young.
Some habits have less spiritual import than others. If a child is trained to brush his teeth every day for 7,250 days until he is eighteen years old, he will most likely brush his teeth on a daily basis for the rest of his life. But this lesson applies to much more than brushing teeth. Generally, a child who is raised in the nurture and admonition of the Lord will not depart from it (Eph. 6:4). Nowadays, parents are not always consistent in this training. Thus, the children pick up on a double-mindedness within the family. When Dad wanted to come home early from the church worship service in order to catch the Super Bowl game, what might he have communicated to his children? Perhaps God was important to the father and mother, at points. But with this kind of inconsistency in the home, some of the children may have caught the vision for the kingdom of God, while others might retain a worldly vision. Moreover, education and training is usually not limited to what children receive from their parents. Often, children from Christian homes are raised and influenced more by their peers, neighborhood friends, and their day school teachers than they are by their parents. Their culture is far more defined by these sources than by their own parents because they spend far more time, in aggregate, with these people than they do with their own parents. Over time, the children’s affections and allegiances are more attached to the ideas and culture of the world, than to the faith-commitments held to by their parents.
Some children learn the way of faithlessness in the home. By example, their parents showed them how to be anxious, how to worry, and how to doubt the grace of God. During days of crisis, these parents would doubt God’s ability to provide, or even to save their own children. They would not turn to the Lord in prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, making their requests known unto God (Phil. 4:5–7). And their children watched the whole thing and walked in the ways of faithlessness.
Then there are those children raised in pride and presumption, always presuming on the grace of God. Their parents would not faithfully and carefully admonish, exhort, rebuke, and warn their children as we see with the father exemplified in the Book of Proverbs. Perhaps these parents were content with a mere profession of faith, a baptism, or a confirmation. Whatever the case, their children learned the lesson well—that they may presume on the grace of God. They never learn that the Christian life is filled with things like repentance, mortification of sin, cutting off right arms, and plucking out right eyes.
At the end of the day, whatever faith and character our children have is a matter of the grace of God. But it is for us to work out that salvation with fear and trembling. It is for us to teach the lessons of faith and humble faithfulness by our own example, and rely on the grace of God to bring about their salvation.
1. How would you describe a perverse (or froward) child or man?
2. How do you fix a froward man?
3. Who is raising our children? From whom do they learn their habits, their speech patterns, their music tastes, etc.?
4. What are we teaching our children? Do we teach them to trust in God or to fear man?