Pro-social mirror: Understanding child behaviors through mirror analogies

 Many parents think that their child is out to get them, in some persecution complex surrounding their child. However, many parents do not understand what true obedience is in the Bible, and why it isn't restrictive to children at all. True surrender to parents, or lack thereof, works like a mirror, meaning however you treat your child is what you will get back as treatment.

Some children emulate this more than others, namely children with special needs, such as those with autism spectrum disorders and/or childhood bipolar disorder. A child with a dual diagnosis of those two disorders eventually proves their pro-spanking parents wrong on the spanking issue. I myself have that dual diagnosis, and my parents eventually just gave up, and started taking parenting advice from me. Once they started treating me with respect, the opposite came to them.

Colossians 3:20-21 KJV:

Children, obey your parents in all things, as is well-pleasing unto the Lord. Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they become discouraged.

The Greek root word translated "obey" is υπακουο (Latin: hupakouo) and refers to surrender to parents, and one of a specific type, meaning voluntary surrender to the care and support of parents, in the form of providing custody, in where the parents are not deserving of anything in return from their child, not even respect. Respect in parenting is earned, not demanded. If you treat a child with disrespect, they will treat you with the same. Tit-for-tat.

The Greek root word translated "provoke...to anger" is ερεθιζο (Latin: erethizo) and refers to God's definition of child abuse, namely the slightest of personal slights perceived by the child from an adult, when imposed willfully or recklessly. This is a direct command from God through the Apostle Paul for fathers to stop punishing their children, and conform to the Law. Many fathers who were Greek converts to the Christian church whipped their sons and spanked their daughters. Spanking then was a way to "purify" a sexually rebellious daughter, and enforce chastity in her. These pagan traditions were totally alien to Jewish law and custom, which the Christian church took further. Jewish law only allowed for judicial corporal punishment, and only in the Old Testament context. Violations of the Law in the Early Church were grounds for excommunication if the defendant was an adult, with them being repeatedly judged by different members of the church community, as a form of collective gaslighting.

Ultimately, what the Apostle Paul here was saying in delivering this commandment is that when you are harsh with your child, your child rebels, and becomes harsh with you back. In many cases, the rebellion is indirect, meaning they may want to blare shocking music in their room, or maybe simply talk back. Maybe you are even having a power struggle with your 10-year-old daughter. Sometimes, you get a child that hands whatever disrespect you have towards them right back at you, in a convicting way. You slap them across the face for talking back, and they slap you back for controlling them, and every attempt to control leads to control back.

The more you resent your child for their behaviors, the more they resent you for how you treat them. Obedience to parents is not a state of fear imposed by a parent, when practiced properly, but instead is a state of the child mirroring the disciplined and respectful attitudes of the parent in relation to the child, meaning treating a child with respect and warmth will prompt a mirroring response in the child. The child is not morally obligated by any objective law to give back to parents, but as an individual conviction, will give back if the parent provides for and cares for the child in a non-entitled, non-violent, and respectful way that doesn't demand things from others.

The depraved and entitled parents who provoke children to anger will not inherit the Kingdom of God! They will languish in the lake of fire and brimstone, suffering the second death for all eternity! Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!