Righteous pampering: Why God wants you to pamper your children

Many parents think that children need to earn their good parents. This is a common attitude amongst American parents. I myself, as a child, got warmth only when I "deserved" it, and otherwise was punished. Most American parents think that pampering children is the wrong way to parent. However, the fact of the matter is that children need to be pampered. God wants YOU, as a parent, to pamper that child instead of punish him/her.

Righteous pampering is 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 in the family home between parent and child. This secure attachment starts with 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 as holding your child hostage merely for things 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.

Righteous pampering means that God wants you to pamper your children. For the first 6 years of a child's life, children were in constant closeness to mothers, meaning that for those formative years, wherever the mother went, so did the child. The Early Christians practiced birth nudity, meaning that mothers and child were in the nude next to each other, in skin-on-skin format. Mothers breastfed their children usually until age 3 (when they refused the nipple), or else perhaps until age 6 or possibly older. Children were treated as babies until age 6. Mothers responded to the every cry of their child, cooing and picking up the child, then co-snuggling with him/her in skin-on-skin format. Young children under age 6 showed separation anxiety for their mother, meaning they feared their mother "going away and never coming back". Thus, mothers accommodated this normal developmental stage by providing reassuring warmth and sustenance. 

When out and about in public, young children - up until age 6 - were swaddled next to the bosom of mothers in swaddling blankets, with mothers breastfeeding their child in public if summoned to by the child. The swaddled child was tucked underneath the thin, revealing dress of a mother that resembled an apron. The swaddling blankets were made of velvet, and were tied to one breast of the mother, and then across the dot to the right leg of the mother, or vice versa, or both in the case of twins. Mothers responded to crying by holding the swaddled child closer to her bosom, and then cooing. In most cases, children cried silent tears. 

For the latter 7 years of childhood in the Early Church, children played outside freely, venturing farther and farther from home, but then retreating to the sustaining warmth of mothers once more come nightfall, in the form of skin-on-skin co-sleeping. Children co-slept next to mothers until they hit puberty, in which case they wanted their own place to sleep. When children shook off parents then, it was seen as the beginning of the end of closeness with children, in a bittersweet way by mothers, and in an exciting way by fathers.

Respect for parents is commanded in the Bible, but that comes after the child is pampered by their parents for their whole childhood. The pampering of children actually earns their respect and honor. When you pamper your children from day one, they want to respect and honor you as a parent when all is said and done, and they are young adults living on their own. Once children live on their own, the commandment to honor parents kicks in, and then you will see how good of a job you did pampering them, based on how much they respect you. If they totally reject you, that is your fault, not theirs. True respect for parents consists of the child resting in your arms, and no matter how non-entitled or adult they are, they always melt and come undone when you are there. 

The depraved and entitled parents who provoke their children to anger through punitive parenting will not inherit the Kingdon 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!