they will drift through life, never understanding the internal struggles
that lie beneath their most consistent behavior.
(^) Parenting that focuses only on behavior does address the heart.
The problem is that the heart is addressed wrongly. Changing
behavior without changing the heart trains the heart toward whatever
you use as your means. If it is reward, the heart is trained to respond
to reward. If approbation, the heart is trained to strive for approval, or
to fear disapproval. When the experts tell you that you must find what
works with each child, they are saying you must find the idols of the
heart that will move each child.
(^) Your child is a covenantal creature. The heart is the well-spring of
life. Addressing the child’s heart unbiblically plays to the corruption
of his heart as an idolater and provides him with functional idols
around which to organize his life. In this sense, whatever you do
addresses the heart. When I note above that the heart is not addressed,
I mean it is not addressed biblically.
(^) There is another problem. If you address only behavior in your
children, you never get to the cross of Christ. It is impossible to get
from preoccupation with behavior to the gospel. The gospel is not a
message about doing new things. It is a message about being a new
creature. It speaks to people as broken, fallen sinners who are in need
of a new heart. God has given his Son to make us new creatures. God
does open-heart surgery, not a face-lift. He produces change from the
inside out. He rejects the man who fasts twice a week and accepts the
sinner who cries for mercy.
(^) Let’s imagine you are dealing with the problem of a child’s failure
to do his homework. Here are several common, but unbiblical,
approaches used to change a child’s behavior.
(^) Bribery approach: “Do your work all week and I’ll take you to the
ball game.”
(^) Emotional approach: “Please do your work. I get so upset when
you don’t. It makes me feel like crying. I wonder where I went