How to Disciple Your Children

Our children will be discipled by someone. In Scripture, God gives parents the primary responsibility for their child’s discipleship (see Deut. 6:6–9; Ps. 78:5–7; Prov. 1:8–9; 22:6; Eph. 6:4). If parents do not assume this role, then friends, peers, social media, and secular ideologies will. To neglect this parental duty is to surrender our child’s heart to rival gods. Our children were made to worship the true God. While their worship and salvation are sovereign works of grace, God gives us hope with His promises (Acts 2:39). Faithful parents trust the means God uses to disciple our children. Here are five considerations for parents in discipling their children.

1. Actions speak louder than words.

Children grow up observing their parents’ actions. Consequently, parents should aim to say with the Apostle Paul, “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” (1 Cor. 11:1). A parent who repents openly, prays fervently, and loves the Lord vividly will teach more by his life than by his lectures. Jesus said: “The Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise” (John 5:19, emphasis added). Children follow not just what we say, but what we do, and even more, what they see us love. This is why preceding the practical parenting command: “Teach them diligently,” parents are told, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” (Deut. 6:5–9, emphasis added). Our children won’t see a perfect love for Christ, but they must see a genuine love for Him.

2. Discipleship is rooted in Lord’s Day worship with the local church.

Many parents unknowingly disciple their children to prioritize travel sports and weekend activities over gathered worship. But what we model with our calendars powerfully shapes our children’s view of God and His church. In the Reformed tradition, the Lord’s Day is the Christian Sabbath—the first day of the week set apart for worship, rest, and communion with God’s people (Acts 20:7; Acts 2:42; 1 Cor. 16:1–2; Rev. 1:10). This is not a matter of personal preference; “not neglecting to meet together” is a biblical command (Heb. 10:25). It is a decision that “as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord” (Josh. 24:15). Christ said, “Let the children come to me; do not hinder them” (Mark 10:14). We cannot rob our children of the primary place where the gospel is proclaimed and Christ is present in Word and sacrament. 

3. Parents shepherd hearts through formative and corrective discipline.

Formative discipline shapes the heart through diligent teaching both formally—“when you sit in your house”—and informally—“and when you walk by the way” (Deut. 6:7). Corrective discipline aims to remove folly that is “bound up in the heart of a child . . . the rod of discipline drives it far from him” (Prov. 22:15). Do not “provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord” (Eph. 6:4), for “he who loves him is diligent to discipline him” (Prov. 13:24). Our heavenly Father “disciplines the one he loves” (Heb. 12:5). The goal of discipline is not merely behavior modification, but heart transformation such that Christ becomes their only hope and salvation.

4. Children need a biblical worldview.

We largely create the world in which our children grow up. Ideally, that’s a world of continuity where the truths heard at home align with those heard at church and school. While this principle applies differently, God requires all parents to give their children a vision of the world where Christ is supreme in all things (Rom. 11:36). This is why we quiver our arrows and sharpen them before shooting them out into a hostile world (Ps. 127:4). Daniel and his friends were discipled in covenant community under King Josiah’s reforms, and when they entered Babylon, they did not compromise their godly integrity (Dan. 1:4–21; 3:8-30; 6; 2 Kings 23).

5. Children need training within their God-ordained gender.

Boys must be taught to be godly men, and girls, godly women (1 Tim. 2:8–15). In our culture of gender confusion, parents must intentionally teach biblical models of masculinity and femininity and their respective virtues (Prov 1:8-9). Godly men and women in the local church, whether single or married, also play a vital role in these models (Titus 2:1–8). Faithful parents will train their boys to be godly men and their girls to be godly women for whatever future vocations God has for them. If their children marry one day, they will be better prepared for a God-honoring marriage, for God said, “It is not good that man be alone; I will make a helper fit for him” (Gen. 2:18). If God providentially withholds marriage, parents have not erred in their discipleship, for “each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another” (1 Cor. 7:7). In the case of either future marriage or singleness, we must train our children not to awaken love before its time (Song 8:4).

Conclusion

Discipling our children is a weighty calling—but not one without hope. God supplies the grace to persist, “always to pray and not lose heart” (Luke 18:1), as we trust that God will bless our efforts and bring forth kingdom fruit for generations to come.