Notebook Leaflets from the Elmshaven Library, vol. 1

Chapter 29—Home Training

By Ellen G. White

Watch, pray, work. Watching, working, and waiting for the Lord: this is our proper position. We are to act as servants who strive faithfully to do the Master's will. I am particularly burdened in reference to home training. The father is the house-band of the family. This is his position, and if he is a Christian, he will maintain right government in every respect. His authority is to be recognized, but in many families parental authority is never fully acknowledged. Various excuses are framed for the disobedience of children, and the life is a scene of endless variance between parents and children. Often the mother works to counteract the influence of the father, who, she thinks, is too severe, too exacting. 1NL 93.1

If the father is a Christian, he represents the divine authority of God, whose vicegerent he is, and whose work it is to carry out the gracious designs of an infinite God in the establishment of upright principles and the foundation of pure, virtuous, well-balanced characters. But if the father and mother are at variance with each other, the condition of things in the home is demoralizing. Neither the father nor mother receives the respect and confidence essential to correct management. The mother leaves on the minds of the children the impression that she thinks the father too severe; for children are quick to see anything that casts the slightest reflection on rules or regulations, especially if they restrict them in carrying out their inclinations. 1NL 93.2