A Word to You Parents

The love of parents for their children is a wonderful quality. Like most parents, you are undoubtedly concerned with giving your children a good start in life.

But we are sure you realize that there is more to this than simply providing food and clothing for your children and sending them off to school to be educated. To face life successfully, children need moral guidance, principles by which to live. And they need these from their tender years on. Heartbreaking things can and do happen where children receive help too late.

Perhaps, like many parents, you feel somewhat at a loss as to where to begin and what to teach your children. Really, the best principles that can be found anywhere are found in the Bible. Instruction based on the Bible has definite advantages. By it, children come to realize that what they are being told is not just their father’s or mother’s idea. It is what their Creator says; it is his will. This gives a strength to parental counsel that cannot be equaled in any other way.

In the pages of the Bible God encourages parents to take a personal interest in impressing right principles on the minds of their children. It may seem easier to pass this responsibility on to someone else. But doing that means missing out on a very enriching experience. It means giving up the opportunity to reach your child’s heart in a way that you and no one else ever could.

In many homes today parents and children are steadily drifting apart. As children grow older, parents often find it increasingly hard to talk with them about things that matter the most. This book, “Listening to the Great Teacher,” is designed to help to prevent  such a situation in your home. It is designed so that you and your children can read it together. But, more than this, it is designed to stimulate conversation between parents and children.

This is because it calls for a response on the part of the children. You will find many well-placed questions in the printed material. When you come to these, you will observe a dash (—), to remind you to pause and encourage your child to express himself. Children like to be involved. Without that involvement a child’s interest quickly fades. More importantly, though, these questions will help you to learn what is on your child’s mind. Of course, the child may come out with answers that are far from right. But the printed material that follows each question is designed to help the child to develop wholesome patterns of thinking.

When the child learns to read, encourage him to read the book to you, and at times to himself. The more he reads it, the more its good counsel will be impressed on his mind and heart. But, to strengthen the bonds of affection and respect between both of you parents and your child, by all means read the book together, and do it regularly.

Some Bible texts are cited at the end of each chapter. Why not take time to look these up together? You and your children can thereby learn to use the Bible well. Explain what these scriptures are saying. Help make clear any difficult words in the scriptures that you look up, as is done in this book. Doing this, you will be directing your child’s attention to the finest source of guidance in life, the Bible.

We sincerely hope this book will help you and your family to mold your lives so as to be pleasing to the Creator, to your eternal blessing.

​—THE PUBLISHERS