Obedience: Why attachment parenting leads to obedience more than conventional Christian parenting

Many parents want their children to obey, meaning listen to their instructions. Obedience is a common goal in Christian parenting. Most parents believe only punitive measures lead to obedience. The fact of the matter is that attachment parenting leads to obedience using a method that is time-tested and time-honored. 

The Fifth Commandment is repeated in Colossians 3:20-21 KJV:

Children, obey your parents in all things: for this is well pleasing unto the Lord. Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged.

The Greek root word translated "obey" is υπακουο (Latin: hupakouo) and refers to secure, vulnerable rest in the love and grace of parents. Children should rest securely in the sacrifice of parents, just as parent believers rest securely in the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. This refers to children listening to parents, when coming from a secure, restful place. When attachment parenting is properly practiced, especially in the case of skin-on-skin comforting strategies, children naturally listen to parents, and do so because they want to listen on the instinctual level. True obedience is listening to parents on an instinctual level due to attachment parenting fondness and warm regard towards parents, with children not questioning the motives of parents, blindly trusting that such motives are pure and righteous. This commandment lifts up the attachment parenting context for the relevance of all. Biblical obedience is based on the concept of secure attachment, and the positive results coming from having a secure bond with one's child.

The Greek root word translated "provoke...to anger" is ερεθιζο (Latin: erethizo) and refers to damages or offenses, namely the slightest of personal offense perceived by the child in an exchange. including, but not limited to, the slightest of offensive touch or speech perceived by the child, coming from entitlement. This commandment was intended by the Apostle Paul, and understood in the context in which it was given, as a moral statute prohibiting all forms of punitive parenting, including any punishment or controlling demeanor towards a child. In the Old Testament, punitive parents were put to death by way of bloodletting, after punishing their children too many times, and receiving many warnings that their parenting practices were out of compliance with the Law. Parents who punished their children were charged with kidnapping, with "kidnapping" being defined as the slightest of damage or offense stemming from hostage taking - child punishment was seen as holding a child hostage merely for things they did wrong. Parents who merely showed anger towards their children raised suspicion among fellow Jewish and Christian parents, as most parents then had no parent anger whatsoever. Paul was lifting up this historical legal context for a group of Greek Christian parents who brought their pagan custom of spanking and punishing children into the church. There was no such parenting custom among the Early Christians, as the Early Christians practiced attachment parenting. 

Mothers, in biblical times, were primarily charged with the care and protection of children. Mothers did not gain cooperation through spanking or punishment, but instead used attachment parenting, in skin-on-skin format, to gain cooperation. Children didn't wear any clothing at all, and mothers only wore clothing outside the home. Children were held close to parents by way of co-snuggling and co-mingling by day, and co-sleeping by night, all in skin-on-skin format. This formed a secure parent-child bond that would last a lifetime.

Secure attachment affects how children listen to parents, and, by extension, other adults. Secure attachment causes an instinctual reaction where children go along with parents, listening to whatever they have to say, going along with whatever they do. Usually, children follow parents from room to room, sleeping next to them come bedtime. Listening to parents, or obedience, is instinctual in this context, because parents have proven to children that they can be trusted, and do so by being trustworthy.

True biblical obedience is not following parental commands out of fear of punishment, but instead is the automatic, instinctual act of going along with the instructions and whereabouts of parents, not questioning the motives or intentions of parents, trusting that parents know what is best for you. Children sometimes did not listen in biblical times, and that was only when they did not understand, on a cognitive level, the instructions given to them. True obedience is a warm fondness for parents, leading to instinctively listening to and going along with them, in a tag along fashion.

The depraved and entitled parents who provoke their children to anger through punitive parenting will not inherit the Kingdom of God! Let them be cast forever into the lake of fire and burning sulfur, which is the second death prepared for Satan and his accomplices! Let them descend into the abyss which is the ever-burning Hell of fire and torment, suffering God's Wrath forever and ever! Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!