Righteous pampering: Why it is okay to pamper your children

Many parents are afraid to do it. Most parents are afraid of being seen as pampering their children. This is a common attitude amongst American parents. Most American parents are afraid that pampering their children will lead to spoiling them. The fact of the matter is that the Bible, when understood in its Hebraic context, says to pamper your child. 

Pampering children is part of the Christian doctrine of mutual submission. It says 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 are to rest securely in the sacrifice of parents, just as parent believers are to rest securely in the Sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Parents are to be extensions of Christ in the family home, dutifully and selflessly submitting to children as they would to God, expecting absolutely nothing in return, with children resting safely and securely in the submission of parents. Parents are to submit to children as their enemy, from beneath yet from above, revering and fearing children as vulnerable extensions of God. 

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 a child, including, but not limited to, the slightest of offensive touch or speech perceived by a child, stemming 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 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 under the Law as the slightest of damages or offenses stemming from hostage-taking - child punishment was seen in biblical times as holding your child hostage merely for things that they did wrong, thereby treating them as a quartered slave. Paul here was lifting up the Law in order to convict 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 in his writings.

In the Early Christian church communities, parents pampered their children, and wanted to be seen among their fellow parishioners as pampering their children. Mothers, from day one, held their babies all the time, no matter what they were doing. This led to children wanting to be held frequently by mothers, and mothers holding children frequently. 

Children, for the first 6 years of life, were in constant closeness to their children, with the child never leaving her side, and the mother wrapping up the child in swaddling blankets next to her bosom when out and about, perhaps offering the child to suckle her teat if the child was milk-hungry. Around the age of 6, children started to shake off the closeness of mothers, venturing farther and farther from home, exploring the terrain, playing with same-age peers out in the open, then retreating to the sustaining warmth of mothers once more, usually through skin-on-skin co-sleeping, with both children and mothers being naked in the family home. Mothers served as home base as children came home from a day playing outside...This context is applicable today much as it was in the days of old. 

In Ancient Israel also, it was seen as perfectly acceptable and encouraged to pamper your children. Children were frequently held and coddled in the arms of mothers. Israelite homes were warm and loving. This precedent is lifted up in the New Testament with the commandment to not provoke children to anger and the commandment for children to be resting in the loving arms of parents. The Early Christians also strived to pamper children within their own community. This was called righteous pampering, and most Jewish parents during the time of Christ and His Apostle Paul took this tenet of Jewish parenting seriously. The Early Christians were seen then as part of the Jewish faith, and practiced the same parenting as their Hellenistic Jewish neighbors, only they took the righteous pampering further.

The depraved and entitled parents who provoke their children to anger 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 ever-burning Hell of fire and torment, suffering God's Wrath forever and ever! Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!