Righteous pampering: Why God wants parents to pamper their children

Many parents believe pampering your child is not the right thing to do. Most American parents take the attitude that they don't want to be seen as pampering their children. However, God's Law is above the law of the land, and God's Law, as understood in context, says to pamper and baby your children.

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. This word ultimately refers to a secure attachment between parent and child in the family home. This secure attachment ultimately comes from parent submission, where parents are to submit to their children as they would to God, from beneath yet from above, 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 his original context, as a moral statute prohibiting all forms of punitive parenting, including, but not limited to, any punishments, reprimands, and other controlling demeanor towards children. In the Old Testament, punitive parents were put do 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 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 secular writings. Paul may not have gotten along with the women of the church, but he sure loved children, and even took in a few orphaned children during his time as a deacon. Indeed, Greco-Roman parents got out the scourge of cords in order to punish their children, but NOT the Christians among them - the Early Christians were persecuted largely for being "too soft" on their children.

The Bible and its context calls for righteous pampering of a child, but only in a certain way. For the first 6 years of a child's life, children were in constant closeness with mothers, meaning that wherever the mother went, so did her child. For the first 2 years of a child's life, children were constantly held by mothers, either in her arms, or else in a papoose bag on her back when mom's hands were full. When children were aged 2-6, they ranged next to mother, following mom all through the house, not letting mom out of their line of sight, fearing that mothers would "go away and never come back". Whenever a child cried, mothers cooed at their children, before picking them up and cradling them in her arms next to her bosom. When mothers were out and about with their children, they swaddled their children next to their bosom in swaddling blankets, cooing when children started to cry, then holding the child closer to her bosom. Children, when swaddled to the bosom of mothers, cried silently and quietly.

Cooing was a primal way of reassuring and validating the upsets of children. When mothers cooed at their children in the biblical context, children fell into line, and immediately started calming down. All they needed was for mom to coo at them, and then they felt heard, with their upsets being validated by the cooing vocalizations coming from mothers.

Children older than age 6 played freely, venturing farther and farther from home, albeit after checking in with mom. Children played some very high-risk games by today's standards. Older children were pampered by being given freedom to roam and play. At the end of the day, children were called by their name to dinner, and then bedtime.

Come nightfall, children co-slept next to mothers, in skin-on-skin format. This co-sleeping lasted until the onset of puberty, when children wanted their own place to sleep. This was the beginning of the end of a mother's closeness and warmth with children. From there, parents were shaken off, and children were soon to leave the nest.

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 day and night forever and ever! Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!