Teaching Children to Live Righteously

The Bible teaches us how to respect God.

  1 "Listen, you priests; this command is for you!  2 Listen to me and take it to heart. Honor my name," says the LORD Almighty, "or I will bring a terrible curse against you. I will curse even the blessings you receive. Indeed, I have already cursed them, because you have not taken my warning seriously.  3 I will rebuke your descendants and splatter your faces with the dung of your festival sacrifices, and I will add you to the dung heap.  4 Then at last you will know it was I who sent you this warning so that my covenant with the Levites may continue," says the LORD Almighty.  5 "The purpose of my covenant with the Levites was to bring life and peace, and this is what I gave them. This called for reverence from them, and they greatly revered me and stood in awe of my name.  6 They passed on to the people all the truth they received from me. They did not lie or cheat; they walked with me, living good and righteous lives, and they turned many from lives of sin.  7 The priests' lips should guard knowledge, and people should go to them for instruction, for the priests are the messengers of the LORD Almighty.  --Malachi 2: 1-7 New Living Translation   As a home schooling mother, I think it is imperative for me to teach my children about God.  They must also learn to revere, or respect, God.  To show that, I must introduce them to what our God requires.  I must also show the consequences of not respecting God.  This chapter 2 of Malachi is a perfect example.  Malachi 2 is about the priests and the Levites.  I think it also applies to us in our day.  We are to love God and respect Him or we will suffer through curses.  Just as God had asked the priests to honor and obey His commands, we are asked today to do the same.  Just as the bad fate was predicted for not following God's commands, we are liable to fall into the same fate, too.  We, as parents, should ask our kids to read the entire chapter 2 of Malachi.  It would give them an indication of how they should conduct their lives.  Our children would know they should keep from lying and cheating.  They would also know that they can turn others from wrong-doing, too.  Our children, and our society, would be better for it.  How about you, my readers? Are you teaching your children about God?  Are you discussing about what it means to respect God?  Are the children in your life taking to heart that lying and cheating should not be part of their lives?  I encourage you today to consider if your children really are loving and respecting God.  Don't leave it to chance that your children might live righteously.  Our children need guidance.  I pray that God gives you all, my beloveds, His wisdom and peace. 

 
This has been an entry for the Spiritual Sundays series. 

To compile this mini- bible study, I visited: http://www.biblestudytools.com/