Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it. -Proverbs 22:6
I can remember a season when we had reached a point of parenting frustration… “This kid just won’t listen!”
Ever feel completely stuck in your parenting? You’re disciplining and correcting, but behavior isn’t changing. And it’s starting to wear everyone down.
You feel like you’re in a constant cycle of correcting the same bad behaviors with no visible progress. Character doesn’t seem to be taking root in your child, and if something doesn’t give, you’ll throw up your hands as frustration and exhaustion win the day.
A Breaking Point…
Many parents reach a breaking point where they realize that despite their best efforts, one child’s ongoing misbehavior and negative attitude is affecting the entire family.
When this happened in our home, the weight became so heavy that we needed to step back, take a breath, and reassess our approach.
For us, this meant creating space to refresh and reflect, to process the toll it was taking, and to prepare mentally and emotionally for a different strategy moving forward.
A Better Approach…
In these moments of reflection, we discovered what we truly needed: an intentional shift from correction to training.
While correction will always be necessary, it’s easy to create an imbalance between correction and training without realizing it.
We know we’ve tipped too far when we’re regularly barking orders and expectations, but not taking time to tenderly instruct and guide our child’s heart.
This is why the Bible specifically instructs us to TRAIN up our children.
When a parent begins emphasizing training over correction, something shifts—and interestingly, not immediately in the child, but in the parent’s own heart and approach.
Over time, this change gradually impacts the child as well.
Correction focuses on behavior. Training focuses on character.
This transformation happens when a parent does more teaching and training and less correcting and rebuking—more parenting forward and less focusing backward.
- Rather than simply addressing what’s wrong, parents now train in what’s right.
- Rather than just telling the child what to do, we show the child how to do it.
- Rather than demanding, we’re directing.
- Rather than focusing solely on the bad fruit, we’re addressing the root heart issues.
We begin to intentionally train our kids’ hearts instead of just trying to conform their behavior.
We start parenting forward rather than backwards, and there’s a significant difference.
