Parenting

(Today and Thursday, we’ll be posting two perspectives on Christian parenting. Anne Sokol’s focuses on Tedd Tripp’s popular book on parenting. In tomorrow’s article, Aaron Blumer writes on “The Simplicity of Biblical Parenting.”)

For brevity, I focus here on my disagreements with Shepherding a Child’s Heart—its application of some Scriptures and its overall emphasis. My main concerns are these:

1. The book’s focus on requiring obedience as the primary component of the parent/child relationship and emphasis on parental authority as the right to require obedience.
2. Tripp’s teaching that spanking is the means the parent must use in order to bring a child back into “the circle of blessing.”
3. Tripp’s interpretation that the “rod” in Proverbs equals spanking, that spanking is even for young children, that spanking is the God-ordained means of discipline (which parents must obey) and that use of the rod saves a child’s soul from death.
4. His portrayal of any other style or method of parenting in a derogatory manner and training parents’ consciences that failure to discipline as his book teaches is disobedience to God.

These points are the heart of Tripp’s teaching, and while his book contains many truths, it does not communicate the full truth of gospel-oriented parenting, as he claims it does.

My dad recently came home from a writers’ conference where he picked up a book and a new DVD for us to proof for our children. The book was entitled [amazon 1595551220] by the creator of Veggie Tales, Phil Vischer (more commonly known as the voice of Bob the Tomato). Before reading the book, I looked at the DVD case which was entitled . While I was cautiously excited that Phil Vischer had created a new company called Jelly Fish Labs, I was also concerned. It looked as if the series was going to be a really low-budget, thrown together show. Instead of computer animated characters It featured puppets that didn’t look especially engaging—at least to an adult. That wasn’t my only concern, however.

I confess that, more often than not, I am a Veggie Tales fan. I’ll even admit that I’ve watched Veggie Tales video without children present and have actually enjoyed the experience immensely. However, nobody has to see many episodes to realize that Veggie Tales is a bit lacking in spiritual depth. The show teaches good biblical principles to children in a creative, funny, and clean way that’s entertaining for everyone—so I am not complaining. I own many of the Veggie Tales stories and frequently hum some of Larry’s Silly Songs. Plus, Veggie Tales DVDs reinforce the values and principles that my wife and I are teaching our children—and our children really enjoy them. But, honestly, how much insight into Scripture could my kids really glean from a Bible-overview from the Veggie guy?