Getting children to listen: How to get children to listen (without punishment or force)

Many parents want children to listen to them. This is a common wish for parents. Most American parents want children to listen. Sadly, most American parents still think that punishment gets children to listen. The fact of the matter is that punishment is not a way to get children to listen. Children need a secure attachment, formed in the first 6 years of a child's life, in order to listen to parents for a lifetime. Children need a securely attached start to life in order to listen to parents. Children are not obligated to listen to parents until they leave the house. 

A secure attachment is a part of the Christian doctrine of mutual submission. See 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 submission of parents. Children are to rest securely in the sacrifice of parents, just as parent believers rest securely in the Sacrifice of Jesus Christ. This commandment lifts up the customary law that commands a secure attachment within the family home between parent and child. This secure attachment comes from parent submission, while expecting absolutely nothing in return. 

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 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 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 your child 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. 

Children in biblical times listened better, in fact, than children today. This is because they had a secure attachment with their parents - first their mother, and then their father. For the first 6 years of a child's life, children were in constant closeness to mothers, meaning that wherever the mother went, so did the child. The Early Christians practiced birth nudity, meaning that mothers and children were in the nude next to each other, in skin-on-skin closeness and intimacy. Mothers responded to the every cry of children, cooing while picking up the child, then co-snuggling with children in skin-on-skin format. Children under age 6 showed separation anxiety towards their mothers, fearing that mom will "go away and never come back". Mothers responded to the cries of separation anxiety with reassuring and sustaining warmth. Older children played freely outside, then retreating to the sustaining warmth of mothers come nightfall, in the form of skin-on-skin co-sleeping. Co-sleeping ended when the child hit puberty, and wanted their own place to sleep. 

Respect for parents was a mandate under church ordinance in the Early Church, but only after the child both became an adult and left the home. Until then, parents sought to earn the respect of their children, forming a secure attachment with their children. Children were pampered and coddled for the first 6 years, and then allowed to roam free for the latter 7 years of childhood. When children left the home, they gave thanks to their parents by treating them with the utmost respect, with parents earning the every respect that they were given.

Parents had no authority to issue lawfully binding orders in biblical times towards dependent children. Children listened to parents anyway, as children had a secure attachment with parents, meaning they were close to their parents. Parents pleaded with their children, expecting absolutely nothing in return, but nonetheless got much cooperation in return. The first 6 years of closeness with mothers set children up to listen to their parents, including their fathers. Parents could only issue lawfully binding orders after the child left the house, and the child could still issue orders to their parents. Abusive parents were usually shunned by their children, and Christian law in the Early Church allowed for it. 

Religious education was also motivated, on the part of the child, by secure attachment. Parents left out a Bible where the child could find it. The child usually found it, and learned to read on the Bible. Fathers would read their child the Bible, and the child would learn to study the Bible on their own. When caught studying the Bible on their own, they were lavishly praised and encouraged to "keep going down the straight path".

The depraved and entitled parents who provoke their children to anger through punitive parenting will not inherit the Kingdom of God! Let them forever be 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!