The Children For Christ by Andrew Murray

And now comes the teaching as to what doing good is: `Keep thy tongue
from evil, and thy lips from speaking guile. Depart from evil, and do
good; seek peace, and pursue it.’ Sins of the tongue, sins of
disobedience, sins of temper: these are the three principal temptations
children are exposed to, and against which parents have to guard them.
`Keep thy tongue from evil, and thy lips from speaking guile.’ Let the
Christian parent strive after a deep conviction of the power of the
tongue. It reveals what is in the heart; it sets it further on fire, by
encouraging the utterance of the evil there. It is the medium of
intercourse and influence on others. It is the index of the presence or
the want of that integrity or uprightness which is the very foundation
of true character. Parents! study above everything to make your
children true — first true in words, and then true in heart and deed. A
child’s truthfulness and integrity may be the beginning of his walking
in the truth of God. `I have no greater joy than to hear that my children
walk in the truth:’ let this be your aim even with the little children.
`Depart from evil, and do good.’ To a young child the first evil is that
which his parent forbids. The parent is to him as a conscience, as a God.
Train your little ones to flee from evil, to depart, to come away from
everything naughty and forbidden. And to do good: keep it occupied, if
possible, in what is good, as being allowed by you and pleasing to you.
Stir and strengthen its young will, train it to do good; not to think and
wish and feel good, but to do it. It is the will, and what it does, that
makes the man.
Seek peace, and pursue it.’ To quarrel is a sin that comes so easily with
children. Let us train ours to respect the rights of others, to bear and to
forgive when ours are affected, or to seek redress only from the parent.
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