"Those who spare the rod hate their children, but those who love them are diligent to discipline them." Thus the New Revised Standard Version renders Proverbs 13:24, a reminder that not all the wisdom of that book can be applied today - at least literally! For Jesus taught that true relationships are built on love, not on sanctions - the days of "eye for eye, tooth for tooth" are over. A parent's rôle is one of leadership, of setting out goals, "bringing children up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord" (Eph 6:4).
The Bible is full of children. There are the grown-up kind, like the Prodigal Son, who goes and squanders his inheritance in the hippy discos of "a distant country" (Luke 15:13). There are the kind who taunted Elisha: "Go away, bald head!" (2 Kings 2:23 - they got mauled by a bear for their naughtiness). There are the kind that Jesus presented to his disciples as an example of those who are greatest in the kingdom of heaven: "Do not despite one of these little ones, for, I tell you, in heaven their angels constantly see the face of my Father in heaven."
We are (I hope!) not so irresponsible as the Prodigal Son, not so rude as Elisha's tormentors, and, alas, not so meek as the child Jesus showed the disciples, but we are all children - children of God. Some of the people who went out to John the Baptist prided themselves that they had Abraham for their father. But the Christian message is that of the Lord's Prayer: it is God who is our father.
Of course God is father of all (Eph 4:6). But as Christians, we have a deeper relationship with God. As Paul reminds the Romans, when we are born again though God's Spirit, we do not "receive a spirit of slavery, but ? a spirit of adoption. When we cry 'Abba! Father!' it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ." (Romans 8:15-17)
God's family, like any human family, is never static. Each generation brings new insights, and also new problems. Young people today do not dance the minuet, do not bowl hoops, do not sweep chimneys. What would a young person from 300 years ago make of a modern heavy metal band, a televised cup final or a session on Twitter or Facebook? Parents, teachers, preachers all seek to hand the values of their generation on to the next. But clearly their children are not clones - they have ideas and values of their own. Which values are our core values, and which are the ones which we need to adapt to new times and new ideas?
Just as parents pass things on to their children, so children inherit things from earlier generations. But grandfather's half-plate camera or grandmother's treadle sewing machine are of little use in 2009 - they belong in a museum. What parts of our Christian heritage are of little use? We no longer listen to two-hour sermons, we no longer insist that women wear hats in church, we no longer treat divorced people as outcasts - what next? How can we distinguish between the baby and the bathwater, between what is valuable and what is "a tradition of the elders" (Matthew 15:1-9)?
What we inherit from God, though, is nothing so transient. Jesus promised that anyone who has joined his family, who "has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields, for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold, and will inherit eternal life." (Matthew 19:29) And this eternal life is "knowing you, the one true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." (John 17:3) Not knowing about God, but knowing God, as children know their parents. For God is a parent whom we can love and trust. "Beloved," says 1 John 3:2, "we are God's children now: what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we shall be like him, for we will see him as he is." That indeed is something for a child to look forward to!
HD