excerpted from Richard Baxter's Christian Economics, chapter VI: MORE SPECIAL MOTIVES FOR A HOLY AND CAREFUL EDUCATION OF CHILDREN

Motive V.  Consider also how many and great are your advantages above all others for your children's good. (continued...)

9.  You have opportunity of speaking to them in the most familiar manner; which is better understood than the set speech of a minister in the pulpit, which few of them mark or understand.  You can quicken their attention by asking questions which put them upon answering you, and so awaken them to a serious regard of what you say.

10.  You are so frequently with them, that you can repeat your instructions, and drive them home, that what is not done at one time, may be done at another; whereas other men can seldom speak to them, and what is so seldom spoken is easily neglected or forgotten.

11.  You have power to place them under the best means, and to remove many impediments out of their way which usually frustrate other men's endeavors.

12.  Your example is near them and continually in their sight, which is a continual and powerful sermon.

By all these advantages God hath enabled you, above all others, to be instruments of your children's good, and the first and greatest promoters of their salvation.

from Psalm 119:

 9 How can a young man cleanse his way?
         By taking heed according to Your word.
 10 With my whole heart I have sought You;
         Oh, let me not wander from Your commandments!
 11 Your word I have hidden in my heart,
         That I might not sin against You.
 12 Blessed are You, O LORD!
         Teach me Your statutes.
 13 With my lips I have declared
         All the judgments of Your mouth.
 14 I have rejoiced in the way of Your testimonies,
         As much as in all riches.
 15 I will meditate on Your precepts,
         And contemplate Your ways.
 16 I will delight myself in Your statutes;
         I will not forget Your word.

 

excerpted from Richard Baxter's Christian Economics, chapter VI: MORE SPECIAL MOTIVES FOR A HOLY AND CAREFUL EDUCATION OF CHILDREN

Motive V.  Consider also how many and great are your advantages above all others for your children's good. (continued...)

5.  Your authority over your children is most unquestionable.  They will dispute the authority of ministers, yea, and of magistrates, and ask them who gave them the power to teach them, and to command them?  But the parents' authority is beyond all dispute.  They will not call you tyrants or usurpers, nor bid you prove the validity of your ordination, or the uninterruptedness of your succession.  Therefore, father and mother, as the first natural power, are mentioned rather than kings or queens in the fifth commandments.

6.  You have the power of the rod to force them.  Prov. xxii. 15, "Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child, but the rod of correction shall drive it far from him."  And your correction will be better understood to come from love, than that of the magistrate or any other.

7.  You have best opportunity to know both the diseases and temperature of your children; which is a great advantage for the choosing and applying of the best remedy.

8.  You have opportunity of watching over them, and discerning all their faults in time; but if a minister speak to them, he can know no more what fault to reprehend, than others tell him, or the party will confess.  You may also discern what success your former exhortations had, and whether they amend or still go on in sin, and whether you should proceed to more severe remedies.

from Colossians 3:

20 Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing to the Lord.
21 Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged.

 

excerpted from Richard Baxter's Christian Economics, chapter VI: MORE SPECIAL MOTIVES FOR A HOLY AND CAREFUL EDUCATION OF CHILDREN

Motive V.  Consider also how many and great are your advantages above all others for your children's good.  As,

1.  Nothing doth take so much with any one, as that which is known to come from love:  the greater love is discerned in your instruction, the greater success may you expect.  Now your children are more confident of their parents' love, than of any others; whether ministers and strangers speak to them in love, they cannot tell; but of their parents' love they make no doubt.

2.  And their love to you is as great a preparative to your success.  We all hearken to them that we dearly love, with greater attention and willingness than to others.  They love not the minister as they do their parents.

3.  You have them in hand betimes, before they have received any false opinions or bad impressions; before they have any sin but that which was born with them:  you are to make the first impressions upon them; you have them while they are most teachable, and flexible, and tender, and make least resistance against instruction; they rise not up at first against your teaching with self-conceitedness and proud objections.

4.  Your children do wholly depend on you for their present maintenance, and much for their future livelihood and portions; and therefore they know that it is their interest to obey and please you; and as interest is the common bias of the world, so is it with your children; you may easilier rule them that have this handle to hold them by, than any other can do that have not this advantage.  They know they serve you not for nought.

from Proverbs 3:

11 My son, do not despise the chastening of the LORD,
      Nor detest His correction; 
      12 For whom the LORD loves He corrects,
      Just as a father the son in whom he delights.