Thanksgiving: How to be thankful for your child

It is November, meaning Thanksgiving is right around the corner. Thanksgiving, as a holiday, is about giving thanks to what you have, and so we are talking on this blog a lot about gratitude and thanksgiving for children. Most parents think they are thankful for their children, but they aren't. Most parents simply take their children for granted. However, God said to be thankful for children. Having children is a luxury, not a right.

Being thankful for your child does not come in a vacuum. The giving of thanks for your child comes from Christian love for your child. This love is denoted by the Greek root word αγαπαο (Latin: agapao) and refers to, in the context of parenting, prioritizing children first, and yourself as a parent last, to the point of dutiful and selfless submission to the every vulnerable need of children, expecting absolutely nothing in return, valuing children as extensions of God. True Love does not come from pride or desire, but from a place of fearful conviction, where parents are convicted of the fact that they are depraved and decadent sinners who are deserving of absolutely nothing, from children and others. This prompts the sinner/parent to pay due penance by serving their child. Children in biblical times were seen as the neighbor of children, not the enemy.

The phrase "expecting absolutely nothing in return" is key to understand gratitude and thanksgiving, as it implies not expecting anything, period. When you are convicted that you are deserving of absolutely nothing, you expect nothing from anyone, and then you end up being thankful for what you have. Being truly thankful for your child involves knowing you don't deserve anything from your child, and you don't deserve your child either.

Children are extensions of God on earth, called to convict all of adult-kind of their charitable side, as installments of God. In the Early Church, as well as Ancient Israel, children were seen as installments of God called to bring out the charity in adults, and then judge them for how charitable the adults were. The topic of children, then, was a sobering and convicting topic for adults in the Early Church, as well as preceding Jewish society. Parents were thankful for whatever their children brought to them, meaning any joy that children brought was something parents were thankful for. Parents even took joy in the mischief and misdeeds of children. Children in Ancient Israel and the Early Church could do no wrong in the eyes of adults, even if they did.

The Greek root word denoting entitlement in the New Testament, including parental entitlement, and cross-referencing the Tenth Commandment, is πλεονέκτης (Latin: pleonektés) and refers to, officially speaking, wanting things from children, to the point of imposition. However, the unofficial definition of parental entitlement is wanting things from children, period. It is not good to want anything in life, including from children, but since we all want things from children, it is good to ask politely and appropriately for things from children, and accept when children can't or won't give us what we want. Most parental entitlement comes from a deserving attitude towards children. You, as a parent, are a depraved and decadent sinner who is deserving of absolutely nothing, from children or anyone else. Then, once you take that attitude towards your children, you will be thankful for your children, meaning each and every one of them individually, taking note of their every trait and preference, providing for them thereby. Deadly entitlement is want imposed on another person. Deadly entitlement towards children, meaning deadly parental entitlement, becomes child abuse once the imposed wants are perceived by the child. See Colossians 3:21 KJV:

Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged.

The Greek root word translated "provoke...to anger" is ερεθιζο (Latin: erethizo) and refers to damages or offenses, namely the slightest of personal offenses perceived by the child, including, but not limited to, the slightest of offensive touch or speech, coming from entitlement. This commandment was intended by the Apostle Paul, and understood in its original context, as a moral statute prohibiting all forms of punitive parenting, including any punishments or controlling demeanor towards children. In the Old Testament, punitive parents were put to death by way of bloodletting, after punishing their children one last time. Parents who punished their children were charged with kidnapping, with "kidnapping" being defined as the slightest of damages or offenses stemming from hostage-taking - child punishment was seen then as holding your child hostage merely for things they did wrong, thereby treating your own child as a quartered slave. Paul here was lifting up this context to a group of Greek Christian parents who brought their pagan custom of spanking and punishing children into the church. Paul, contrary to popular legend, was anti-spanking, and opposed any and all punishment of a child. Paul, here, and in the secular pamphlets accompanying the epistle, was ultimately trying to instill gratitude for children in Greek and Roman Christian parents, and the only way to do that is to convict them of their sins towards their child. 

This Thanksgiving, be grateful for your child, giving thanks for the every joy they bring to you. You could lose that child at any time, perhaps to early death or other calamities. You are not deserving of the child you have, or anything from them. God can take away your child at any time, and He has to some parents. So, be thankful for your child.

The depraved and entitled parents who provoke their children to anger through punitive parenting will not inherit the Kingdom of God! Let them be forever cast 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 Hell of fire and torment, suffering God's Wrath forever and ever! Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!