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Recipe for one parenting book

Take one favourite and fashionable parenting philosophy.

Add 10 sets of 10 steps, five guarantees and six dire warnings.

Mix with one heaped tablespoon each of anxiety, fear and uncertainty.

Sprinkle with Bible verses and/or psychological studies.

Decorate with a cover shot of a perfect family. Top with a catchy title.

It's done when it leaves a lingering taste of self-doubt.

Serve with lashings of guilt or pride.

I have far too many parenting books on my shelves. I have even read some of them. Like many educated parents, my motto is “When in doubt, research“.

I try not to read parenting books too often for, while some brim with biblical principles and wise advice, others should come with a health warning: “May produce unnecessary guilt and even despair in susceptible readers”.

My personal prize for ‘Parenting Book Title Most Likely to Produce Despair’ is awarded to any title including the words “If only we'd known”. Prize for ‘Parenting Book Most Likely to Induce Guilt’ goes to all those baby books which tell new parents how to care for their baby, right when they're at their most inexperienced and desperate, and predict long-term damage if you reject their methods.

Parenting books address us at our most vulnerable. They promise a solution to the intense uncertainty and inadequacy we feel as parents. Everything we read in a parenting book carries more weight because our children matter so much to us. We're left questioning our methods. Will our children be teen rebels or psychologically scarred adults if we choose the wrong strategies? Is it too late? Have we already ruined our children's lives?

If we're convinced by what we read, we look down on parents who raise their children differently. I know of one church which split over which parenting model to follow.

Here are some promises and threats found in well-known parenting books. You may recognize some of them. No doubt you can add your own:

• A baby who is left to cry himself/herself to sleep will be unable to form close emotional attachments when older.
• A baby who is not left to cry himself/herself to sleep will lack self-discipline when older.
• If you smack your child, you are abusing them, and they will learn to abuse others.
• Time-out will produce emotionally needy or distant children.
• Use modern reflective listening strategies or your children won't want to communicate with you as teenagers.
• Don't interfere when children fight or when they're facing difficulties, or they will never become independent and resilient.
• If you praise your children, they will be approval junkies as adults.

And then there are suggestions which, while not presented as rules, may leave us feeling like we have doomed our children to lives of insecurity and unfulfilled possibilities:

• Have a ‘family worship time’ every day.
• Each parent should take each child out for one-on-one time once a month.
• Create treasured memories for your children through special outings and scrapbooks.
• Expose your children to great literature, classical music and theatre.
• Mozart in the womb will make your child smarter.
• Buy your children open-ended toys, and provide a rich learning environment.
• Ensure that your children address all adults by their title.
• Decorate your table beautifully whenever you eat as a family.

Don't get me wrong, I love some of these suggestions, and have tried to implement them. But I have learned to regard them with caution. At their best, parenting books take biblical principles and apply them to real-life situations with self-deprecating wisdom. But the risk is always there: in a realm of life where we are so desperate for something—anything!—that will work, we turn their suggestions into rules, and their rules into grace-quelling legalism.

Even the best parenting book needs to be read with care.

Next: how should we read parenting books?

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I've often been intrigued by James 3:1. Here is a rather literal translation of the verse from the New King James version:

My brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment. (Jas 3:1 NKJV)

The question that intrigues me is this: who are the ‘we’ who shall receive a stricter judgment? The ESV and NIV both add an interpretative phrase “we who teach”. This resolves the ambiguity; it assumes that God will judge Christian teachers (e.g. James) more strictly than non-teachers (such as the majority of James' readers). This isn't an unreasonable assumption, given that James is clearly speaking about teachers in the first half of the verse. However, it is still an assumption. The words “who teach” are not in the original text. The NKJV (and some other translations) follow the original more closely by simply stating that “we shall receive a stricter judgment”. I want to suggest that the ESV and NIV are wrong in adding the words “who teach”, and that the ‘we’ who will receive stricter (or literally, a ‘greater’) judgment are not teachers, but Christians in general.

The first reason is the immediate context. In verse 2, James gives the reason for verse 1: “For we all stumble in many things”. He then goes on to speak about the dangers of speaking, seemingly for all Christians.

The second reason is that every time James speaks about ‘we’ or ‘us’ or ‘our’ in his letter (1:18, 2:1, 2:21, 4:5, 5:11, 5:17), he seems to be including all his readers. So it's less likely that ‘we’ in 3:1 refers to some group other than his readers.

And the third reason comes from a brief survey of what James teaches about judgment in the rest of his letter:

[H]ave you not shown partiality among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts? (Jas 2:4)

So speak and so do as those who will be judged by the law of liberty. For judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment. (Jas 2:12-13)

Do not speak evil of one another, brethren. He who speaks evil of a brother and judges his brother, speaks evil of the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is one Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. Who are you to judge another? (Jas 4:11-12)

Do not grumble against one another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Behold, the Judge is standing at the door! (Jas 5:9)

But above all, my brethren, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or with any other oath. But let your “Yes,” be “Yes,” and your “No,” “No,” lest you fall into judgment. (Jas 5:12)

There is a pattern that quickly emerges from this brief survey: almost every reference to judgment in the book of James teaches us that God will hold all Christians accountable for the way we speak. In the gospel, we have been given new birth into God's pure and perfect will (cf. James 1:18-20). This gospel word is a message of mercy and forgiveness. But it also gives us a greater standard for behaviour. Gospel living is not just about external obedience to the law, but about honouring God's word in every area of life. And this is particularly shown in the way we speak. We must speak with mercy, as those who have been shown mercy. The gospel reveals that God cares deeply about the way we speak to one another.

It seems that James is echoing the teaching of Jesus, such as we find in Matthew 5:21-22:

You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder, and whoever murders will be in danger of the judgment.’ But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And whoever says to his brother, ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. But whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be in danger of hell fire. (Matt 5:21-22)

Doubtless you can think of a number of other sayings of Jesus that teach that our speech is very important to God.

In this way, the gospel gives us a far greater standard for behaviour than a Pharisaic interpretation, for example, that emphasizes external obedience. Forgiveness and mercy are central to God's word in Jesus, and the flipside of this is that we must now speak and treat others with forgiveness and mercy. And God will hold us accountable to this greater standard.

So when James says that ‘we’ shall receive stricter judgment, he is not simply saying that teachers will be judged more strictly than non-teachers; he is saying that Christians will be held to account for the way we respond to the standard of behaviour revealed in the gospel—which involves our speech and our attitudes, and which is far deeper than even the standard of beheaviour required by external conformity to the law of Moses.

This explains why the passage immediately following James 3:1 is about the awesome and often destructive power of the tongue, rather than instructions to teachers specifically.

The upshot of all this is that the application of James 3:1 is wider than is often assumed. It's not only a verse with application to Christian teachers, or those considering taking on such a role. Certainly, the first half of the verse contains a word to potential teachers. But why, according to James, shouldn't many of us become teachers? Not because teachers will be judged more strictly than non-teachers, but because, through the gospel, all Christians have a far greater standard of behaviour than just external conformity to the law: we will all be called to account for every little word that we speak. Teachers have greater opportunity to speak, and greater power to influence others for good or evil when they do speak, and so it is a huge responsibility that must be considered with great care. However, this doesn't let ‘non-teachers’ off the hook: all of us will be held to account for the way we speak to one another, and for the way that we have allowed the gospel of mercy to influence our attitude to others.

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Gordon's stirring and encouraging piece on Spurgeon finished with a typically Chengian twist of the knife: do we work hard enough these days in ministry? Has the pendulum swung too far towards stress-relief and self-maintenance? Do we worry too much about ‘overdoing it’, and thus fail to take up opportunities that come to hand?

The Chengster was even so ungrateful as to bite (or at least nibble) the hand that feedeth him by suggesting that Spurgeon's attitude to his prodigious labours may be at odds with Matthias Media's Going the Distance, which recommends that ministers learn to take care of themselves so that they can keep going for a life-time of ministry.

(By the way, Gordon, I am stunned at the tactical error you have made here. With my MM Publishing Director's hat on, you do realize that I now have no choice but to double your workload and halve your deadlines. Come on, man! I want five new Bible studies by the end of next weak, and no lily-livered excuses!)

It may be wishful thinking on my part, but I fancy that Spurgeon would have liked Going the Distance, judging, at least, by his advice to his student ministers. Here's a quote from his famous lecture, ‘The Minister's Fainting Fits’, on depression and exhaustion in the ministry:

There can be little doubt that sedentary habits have a tendency to create despondency in some constitutions. Burton, in his “Anatomy of Melancholy,” has a chapter upon this cause of sadness; and, quoting from one of the myriad authors whom he lays under contribution, he says—“Students are negligent of their bodies. Other men look to their tools; a painter will wash his pencils; a smith will look to his hammer, anvil, forge; a husbandman will mend his plough-irons, and grind his hatchet if it be dull; a falconer or huntsman will have an especial care of his hawks, hounds, horses, dogs, &c.; a musician will string and unstring his lute; only scholars neglect that instrument (their brain and spirits I mean) which they daily use.” Well saith Lucan, “See thou twist not the rope so hard that it break.” To sit long in one posture, poring over a book, or driving a quill, is in itself a taxing of nature; but add to this a badly-ventilated chamber, a body which has long been without muscular exercise, and a heart burdened with many cares, and we have all the elements for preparing a seething cauldron of despair, especially in the dim months of fog—

“When a blanket wraps the day,
When the rotten woodland drips,
And the leaf is stamped in clay.”

Let a man be naturally as blithe as a bird, he will hardly be able to bear up year after year against such a suicidal process; he will make his study a prison and his books the warders of a gaol, while nature lies outside his window calling him to health and beckoning him to joy. He who forgets the humming of the bees among the heather, the cooing of the wood-pigeons in the forest, the song of birds in the woods, the rippling of rills among the rushes, and the sighing of the wind among the pines, needs not wonder if his heart forgets to sing and his soul grows heavy. A day's breathing of fresh air upon the hills, or a few hours, ramble in the beech woods' umbrageous calm, would sweep the cobwebs out of the brain of scores of our toiling ministers who are now but half alive. A mouthful of sea air, or a stiff walk in the wind's face, would not give grace to the soul, but it would yield oxygen to the body, which is next best.

“Heaviest the heart is in a heavy air,
Ev'ry wind that rises blows away despair.“

The ferns and the rabbits, the streams and the trouts, the fir trees and the squirrels, the primroses and the violets, the farm-yard, the new-mown hay, and the fragrant hops—these are the best medicine for hypochondriacs, the surest tonics for the declining, the best refreshments for the weary. For lack of opportunity, or inclination, these great remedies are neglected, and the student becomes a self-immolated victim.

If I may summarize both Spurgeon and Peter Brain (author of Going the Distance): work hard, play hard. The body needs its rest and exercise as surely as it needs food and drink. The minister who neglects these is “a self-immolated victim”.

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I've appreciated reading the sermons of 19th-century Baptist preacher Charles Spurgeon over the years, and have quoted him on my blog a number of times (not as much as the Pyromaniacs, but still a bit).

So when I came down with the flu and found myself in bed for three days straight, I thought it would be encouraging to pick up Arnold Dallimore's short, well-researched biography of the man himself. Sick Calvinists of the world, unite. Spurgeon, so it happens, was a lot sicker than me for most of his life. He was seriously and often crippingly and painfully ill, both mentally (with depression) and physically, from his mid-30s until his death from illnesses at age 57. The same went for his wife Susannah who, because of chronic illness, was more often than not unable to attend the meetings where he preached.

If you haven't ever read any Spurgeon, do yourself a favour and pick up a book of his sermons where you can, or click through on some of the links in the first paragraph of this post to get just a small taste for his straight-talking, gospel-centred style. Of his Calvinism, Dallimore quotes him (p. 67 of my 1991 Banner of Truth edition) saying

We only use the term ‘Calvinism’ for shortness. That doctrine we call ‘Calvinism’ did not spring from Calvin; we believe that it sprang from the great founder of all truth.

Spurgeon never received any formal theological training, although he'd begun reading Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress and Foxe's Book of Martyrs from the age of six, and progressed on to later Puritan writers such as John Owen and Richard Sibbes by the time he was 10.

Here are some other facts and figures I picked up on the way:

• His father and his father's father were ministers, but he himself was converted through a poorly preached sermon by a layman in another church at the age of 15. Spurgeon at the time said,

  Now it is well that preachers be instructed, but this man was really stupid. He was obliged to stick to his text, for the simple reason that he had little else to say. The text was ‘Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.’ There was, I thought, a glimmer of hope for me in that text.

  It was enough, it turns out, for Spurgeon to put his trust in Jesus.
• He became pastor of Waterbeach Baptist church at age 17.
• He next became pastor at the London church (which became the Metropolitan Tabernacle) from age 19 until his death at age 57. By age 20-21, he was preaching regularly to 2000 people (before microphones and the electric light had been invented).
• He married Susannah at age 21, and had twin sons who later followed him into ministry.
• When asked for the secret of his ‘ success’, he replied “My people pray for me” (p. 49). He not only said it, but appeared to believe it.
• He was known in London for his pastoral visits to the houses of people dying during the cholera epidemic of the 1850s (cholera being, at the time, untreatable, and of unknown cause).
• He had a weekly time set aside to meet individually with people who wanted to become church members because they had become Christians. In this way, he came to know at least 6000 church members by name, together with knowing how they had come to receive Jesus as Lord and Saviour.
• Nevertheless, he was bitterly opposed by many newspaper editors, both secular and religious. His wife kept a scrapbook of such opposition, and filled a huge volume with clippings, and produced a framed wall text quoting Matthew 5:11-12.
• He preached at Crystal Palace at a service of National Humiliation over the Indian Mutiny of 1857. The size of the crowd, counted by turnstile, was 23,654.
• He began and ran a pastor's college offering a two year course. (For a sample of what he taught them, see Lectures to my Students.)
• By 1866, his trainees had begun 18 new churches in London alone.
• His largest work was his seven-volume commentary on the Psalms, The Treasury of David. It sold 148,000 copies during Spurgeon's lifetime.
• He began a door-to-door book-and-tract-sellers (colporteurs) organization to sell Bibles, as well as books, magazines and tracts produced by him. In the year 1878 alone, 94 colporteurs made 926,290 home visits. Their aim was not merely to sell books, but to talk about spiritual questions with the people they met.
• When the Metropolitan Tabernacle was under repair in 1867, the church hired the Agricultural Hall in another part of London for regular meetings. 20,000 turned up to hear him preach on a regular basis.
• Most weeks, and as just a sample of some of his regular duties, Spurgeon wrote, delivered and published a weekly sermon; looked after an orphanage, a pastor's college and an almshouse; read and responded personally to 500 letters; and preached up to 10 times in churches that he had started.
• Susannah Spurgeon became permanently semi-invalid after a serious illness. Although not able to attend church frequently, she found that she was able to begin and maintain a book fund to buy and supply free books for poor pastors, including books from Spurgeon and several Puritan writers. She spoke of sending books to missionaries in “Patna, Bengal, Ceylon, Transvaal, Samoa, China, Oregon, Jamaica, Kir Moab, India, Trinidad, Equatorial Africa, Russia, Natal, Canada, the Congo, Buenos Aires, Cayman, Damascus, Madrid, Lagos and Timbuctoo”.
• The Metropolitan Tabernacle was a place of constant activity, open from 7 in the morning until 11 at night seven days a week, hosting spiritually focused or welfare programmes run by people who lived and worked in the area.
• The busyness of the building is not surprising, since Spurgeon began and maintained 65 different institutions, ranging from welfare organizations through to mission organizations, preacher training colleges, and organizations for the distribution of literature.
• As well as a monthly magazine and many tracts, Spurgeon wrote 140 books.
• For his work on the book Commenting and Commentaries, he read 3-4000 volumes and chose 1437 of them to express an opinion on.
• From 1870, Spurgeon began the practice of, once every three months, asking all Metropolitan Tabernacle members to stay away from church the following Sunday evening in order to allow unconverted people to attend. The members co-operated, yet the Tabernacle was invariably fuller on those Sundays.
• In 1884, at Spurgeon's Jubilee celebration, Deacon Olney of the Metropolitan Tabernacle claimed that on Sunday evenings, there were 1000 members of the Tabernacle regularly involved in conducting meetings outside the Tabernacle.
• I could go on.
• I choose not to.

Despite what may appear, the book is not a hagiography, and records with disappointment Spurgeon's moderate drinking, smoking and use of a church fete to raise money for the completion (debt free) of the Metropolitan Tabernacle.

I have to trust to God's providence that this was the right book for me to read while I was lying sick in bed over the last four days or so. But let me say that Spurgeon's attitude to his own labours do not fit easily with our recommendations in Going the Distance, which we put out for the help of those in long-term ministry.

In contrast, Spurgeon wrote in 1876:

If I have any message to give from my own bed of sickness it would be this—if you do not wish to be full of regrets when you are obliged to lie still, work while you can. If you desire to make a sick bed as soft as it can be, do not stuff it with the mournful reflection that you wasted time while you were in health and strength. People said to me years ago, “You will break your constitution down with preaching ten times a week,” and the like. Well, if I have done so, I am glad of it. I would do the same again. If I had fifty constitutions I would rejoice to break them down in the service of the Lord Jesus Christ. You young men that are strong, overcome the wicked one and fight for the Lord while you can. You will never regret having done all that lies in you for our blessed Lord and Master. Crowd as much as you can into every day, and postpone no work till to-morrow. “Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.” (Ecc 9:10).

(From ‘For the Sick and Afflicted’.)

My uncomfortable feeling is that Spurgeon's advice to the sick minister is rather closer to that of the Apostle Paul than the advice that I would offer. What do others think?

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The word ‘classic’ is bandied around far too much these days—especially by people like me. Today, however, I bring you a snippet from a Briefing article that actually deserves the title. In fact, it's not one article but a series of three by John Woodhouse called ‘The God of Word’, published back when the world was young (in 1988). Here are the concluding paragraphs of part 1:

We might crystallize the point of all this in a simple proposition: Where you have the word of God created faith in God (and nothing else can create real faith in God) there is all of biblical Christianity. Where the word of God is lacking there is no Christianity.

What does this mean for the accusation that evangelical Christianity with its emphasis on words has become an intellectual's religion? There is, I suspect, some truth in the accusation. However, it is one thing to recognize that our faith and life are less than they ought to be. It is another thing to blame that inadequacy on a particular doctrinal emphasis. Noticing symptoms is one thing; diagnosis is another, and prescription is another again.

If our Christianity has become too cerebral it is not because of an emphasis on words. Words are not the property of intellectuals. To quote Moses:

For this commandment which I command you this day is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that you should say, “Who will go up for us to heaven, and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?” Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, “Who will go over the sea for us, and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?” But the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it ... (Deut 30:11-14)

What was true of the word of God then is true of the gospel word. It is not the prerogative of intellectuals. It is near to all of us.

But the righteousness based on faith says, Do not say in your heart, “Who will ascend into heaven?” (that is, to bring Christ down) or “Who will descend into the abyss?” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? The word is near you, on your lips and in your heart (that is, the word of faith which we preach); because, if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. (Rom 10:6-9)

The answer to the error of intellectualizing Christianity is not to change its fundamental word character, but to ensure that we do not obscure or complicate or add to the word of God. We must not seek a level of experience other than faith in God crafted by the Word of God. We need to preach and teach God's word so that every obstacle to the knowledge of God is destroyed (even the obstacle of anti-intellectualism), and every thought taken captive to obey Christ (cf. 2 Cor 10:5).

Evangelical ministry must be flexible and adaptable and imaginative and inventive as far as manner and style goes. But there is simply no liberty for it to be other than ministry of the Word of God:

Him we proclaim, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man mature in Christ. For this I toil, striving with all the energy which he mightily inspires within me. (Col 1:28-29)

Conclusion

It is this that distinguishes evangelical Christianity from all other forms of Christianity. It is what makes evangelical Christianity not one Christian party among many, but authentic Christianity. Giving due emphasis to the Word of God is not only the touchstone for evangelical ministry, it is the point of reference for all our failings.

If our Christianity has become dry and dull and dead, it will be because the Word of God does not occupy the place it should. If our churches have become closed cliques with no concern for society and the world around us, it will be because the Word of God does not occupy the place it should. If we have become prayerless, it will be because the Word of God does not occupy the place it should.

It is not that evangelicals emphasize the Word of God while Catholics emphasize sacraments and charismatics emphasize the Holy Spirit and liberals emphasize good works and Anglicans keep it all in balance! The Word of God is not just the evangelical party flag, some arbitrary element that is our particular hobby horse.

Our whole practice and experience of Christianity flows from this reality: that God has spoken. Everything—and I mean everything—is a consequence of that reality.

(From ‘The God of Word’, Briefing #10, Sept 1, 1988.)

Next Saturday, we'll snip something juicy out of Part 2 of the series: ‘Word and Spirit’.

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