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Weekly Devotional

Eph. 6:2-3…2 “Honor your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), 3 “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.”

Recently, I have been trying to teach my three-year-old son to obey us more promptly. I want him to break from his habit of immediately answering "no" to everything we ask. To accomplish this, I've been using toys as motivation, along with repeating the phrase "good boys get toys."

I debated with myself if this is improper parenting. Am I conditioning him to always seek a reward as incentive? Am I hindering his development of intrinsic motivation? The opening paragraph of Ephesians chapter 6 has been helpful.

The conjunction "that" in verse 3 signals a purpose clause. Therefore, when combined with verse 2, we see a command and its reward: Honor your parents in order to live a prosperous, long life. In other words, notice that God himself uses rewards (and punishments) to motivate us.

Of course, as we mature (physically or spiritually), we must move beyond external rewards for proper conduct. In terms of the Christian faith, we must grow in our trust in God despite the circumstances. Nonetheless, here is another example of the grace of God. As John Calvin wrote, "For because the eye of our mind is too blind to be moved solely by the beauty of the good, our most merciful Father out of his great kindness has willed to attract us by sweetness of rewards to love and seek after him."