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I think it goes without saying that all parents want their children to learn patience. Most parents don’t need a lecture about developing this virtue in their kids. We already know it’s important. What is hard, however, is actually getting this virtue into the hearts of our children and, if we’re honest, into our own hearts as well.

Let’s look at the goal of patience and then work backwards, breaking it down, as I share some practical ways I’ve taught this very important virtue to my young children.

• The end goal of patience: As parents, we can set the example for our children as they see our hope:

Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain. Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.
James 5:7-8

We need to have more of this rhetoric in our homes. Our end goal on this earth is not success in a career, numerous material possessions, or a high social status. Our goal is to bring Jesus as much glory as we possibly can, putting many jewels in those crowns we will receive to be cast at His feet. Oh, what a glorious joy that cannot be comprehended! Have this in your mind each time you’re losing patience with your children, when they’re misbehaving, when your spouse isn’t understanding, or when no one is helping around the house.  Remember, it’s only an opportunity to put a jewel in that crown and make it more beautiful for Jesus. Remind your children of this too, especially the older ones who are saved. Remind them with joyfulness in your eyes and hope in your tone. Show them through your own display of patience. So much more is caught than taught. Be patient for that fruit, and do the work as the gardener does. He doesn’t talk to his plants to help them grow, he does the work. He waits for the rain and the sun. Let your children see your diligence and patience and you will eventually see the fruit.

• The testimony of an excellent spirit: So where do we start practically with our children? This verse maps it out nicely:

And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; And patience, experience; and experience, hope:
Romans 5:3-4

Start with the daily trials of life. Keep in mind that each little hardship your child goes through is an opportunity allowed by the Father to work on patience. Through your diligent coaching in these problems, your child can view the experience as something that produces wisdom. If they gain wisdom through your example and coaching, they will gain hope which produces an excellent spirit, which, in turn, produces a good testimony for Christ.

• Self-control and patience: We can begin teaching self-control to our toddlers as young as 18-24 months old. This begins with teaching “quiet hands”. Quiet hands is not a punishment. It’s a tool the parent can use when you are getting a sense that the child is heading down a road of losing control (whether in an excited way, a frustrated way, an angry way, or a sad way.) We don’t want to suppress our child’s feelings, but we want them to learn how to control their feelings, to face them, and make a choice. Often I will ask my 3- and 4-year-olds, “Do you want to decide how you act or do you want your feelings to pick?” They always say, “I want to pick” because it helps them think outside of their natural selfishness. This is the beginning of patience.

• Training during periods of no conflict: Training in times of non-conflict is not only highly effective but it can also be very fun. Here’s a great game idea you can do with kids of all ages to strengthen family identity, team-building skills, and patience for one another: We call it “EMERGENCY.” Some of your kids are assigned an ailment (blindness, broken leg, etc) and the other family members have to get them through the house to another room. This encourages communication, service, patience, and being others-centered.
  • Note: in performing this exercise, be sure to use it as an opportunity to teach empathy. This is not an opportunity to make fun of a disabled person, but rather to experience the world in a new way.

Another tool you can utilize in everyday situations that encourages patience is the interrupt courtesy. If you or another adult is talking, the child should put his hand on you so that you know he’s there.  He then waits until he’s given your attention. Small children don’t understand the social skills it takes to consider others, so this is a practical way they can begin to learn patience and putting others first. (Of course they should know that emergencies are always an exception to the rule.) Because small children don’t yet understand this, one way to begin teaching it to them is to consider them.

Remember the purpose of these tools is to bring about genuine fruit that stems from the love of the virtue of patience. If these are taught from a spirit of frustration from the parent, the child will comply but from a fear of reproof, not a love of virtue. Let them see your fruit, and in time they will desire to bear the same fruit.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.                                           Galatians 5:22–23 

Stacy Bullock is a wife and stay-at-home mother of four kids. Married to her high school sweetheart, Joshua, she couldn’t imagine a more fulfilling life. She enjoys playing the cello, horseback riding, and helping other mothers find fulfillment in making their quiver a happy and heavenly home to sharpen and ready their arrows (children) to be launched into the world to glorify God in following His calling on their lives.

Good communication with our children is always important, but once they hit the middle and high school years, it becomes critical.  Communication is not just a one-sided lecture from Mom or Dad about your child’s attitude.  It is a dialogue, involving both parties. Conversations require listening as well as talking. As parents, we need to actively listen to our children and seek full understanding, particularly when conflicts arise. I’ve appreciated this verse when considering some “things” I can use to speak life to my middle or high schooler:

“But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if THESE THINGS are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”                                                                                                                                                             II Peter 1:5-8 NKJV

How do we teach “these things” to our young people? As Christians we want to speak life into our children even when their attitudes toward us are anything but life giving. One way to do that is by instilling in them “these things” from God’s Word:

• Diligence (carefulness or earnestness when accomplishing a task): Talk about diligence when their attitude might be one of complacency or laziness. What are the rewards of a diligent life?  What are the consequences of laziness?  Consider volunteering together with your middle-schooler so you can model diligence and enjoy the fruit of your labor together.

• Faith (conviction that God exists and is the Creator of all): Encourage joy in reading and understanding God’s Word by asking questions about what he’s read. Role play sharing your faith with others.  If he is questioning whether God even exists, take the time to work through his doubts and unbelief together.

• Virtue (moral goodness, modesty, purity): Virtue will help when your teen wants to fit in with the world or join in when others are living a less than moral life. Ask if her friends lead her into wrongdoing or encourage her in righteousness. Help her find ‘the way of escape’ when she faces temptation. Read a book on purity together. Talk about the affects her virtue can have on others.

• Knowledge (intelligence and understanding): Encourage your middle or high schooler to be a good student by asking about his classes. Can he find a Scripture verse that applies to what he is struggling with?  Encourage him to seek counsel from those who are older and wiser.  Help him set goals to learn something new.

• Self-control (mastery of passions and sensual desires): Start a conversation about having a guard over her tongue and how that affects others.  Ask if she rules over her body so that it does not offend others. Encourage her to seek mastery over her anger, fear, worry, etc.  Talk about how you’ve gained victory over your emotions and desires and what you are doing to increase self-control in your areas of weakness.

• Perseverance (patience, endurance, steadfastness): Sometimes our kids just want to give up. Help your young person to keep his goal in view.  Talk about the lessons learned through failure.  Encourage him to persevere when life gets hard by speaking life over him.  Share stories which exemplify endurance.

• Godliness (honor and respect): Encourage your teen to have respect and honor for others by showing her what that looks like. Model godly speech as you speak to her.   Talk about how to respond when an authority figure appears to be unworthy of respect.  Ask if her attitudes and actions would be pleasing to God.

• Brotherly Kindness (love of brothers and sisters): Conversing about brotherly kindness will be a great attitude adjustment for the whole family! Ask how he can demonstrate God’s love toward others.  Is he willing to overlook the minor offenses in others?  Does he rejoice when good things happen to others?  Ask how he can put the desires of others before his own.  Discuss ways to encourage and build others up.

• Love (affection and goodwill toward others): Love ties all of “these things” together. When we can have open conversations with our teens about these various character traits, it will help them grasp God’s unfailing love toward us and help them to reflect that love back to others.

As a parent of grown children, I’m thrilled that my adult children regularly reminisce about the conversations we had together in their middle and high school years. Too many parents shy away from tough subjects, thinking their teen will figure it out on his own. Instead, we need to forge ahead and initiate the difficult conversations with our teens. Be willing to let your young person ask tough questions. Listen.  Many times, the bad attitudes we see in our teens are the result of internal conflict and they just want someone to help them process. When you take the time to have hard conversations using “THESE THINGS” you will see their attitudes soften. When teens can’t figure out the answers to their questions or when they ask for help and get a lecture from their parents instead, they get discouraged. Unhealthy attitudes grow.  Take the time to have tough conversations with your teen using “these things”. You will win their hearts and see them grow closer to you and closer to God in “these things”.

Cynthia Schrock was born in Ohio but grew up on the mission field with her parents in Quito, Ecuador. She married her wonderful husband Eric in 1990. They have two adult children: Ashley and Matthew. In 2016 Cynthia completed a 13 year long journey of homeschooling. Eric and Cynthia have been involved in marriage and parenting ministry over 20 years. Cynthia is a Contact Mom, helping moms with solutions in their daily parenting struggles.  She has also authored a book on celebrating others called The Ultimate Gift of a Birthday.

Attitude is important.  When training our children, we need to insist not only on right action but on right attitude as well.  In part one of this blog, we looked at how to address our children’s attitude by:

• Proactively teaching God’s Word
• Promoting right attitudes and
• Promptly correcting

Now we’ll address how to rectify those attitudes. When correcting for attitude, we have the same tools at our disposal that we use for correcting behavior, including:

• Biblical Reproof/Admonishment – Whether or not an additional consequence is required, your correction must include a biblical reproof. This is more than just a reminder. It calls to mind the biblical standard your child has violated and encourages and instructs him in righteousness. As in the example above about my son’s tone, we identified the attitude by its biblical label and reminded our kids to choose to “put on” the right attitude. For younger children, I often quoted an applicable Scripture. I might say to a 6-year-old complaining about her chores, “God tells us we are to ‘Do all things without complaining…’ (Phil 2:14 NKJV) Are you demonstrating a joyful or complaining spirit right now?” In this way, I can help my child compare her attitude to God’s standard.

• Isolation – Isolation can be used both to help the child gain self-control and as a consequence for a bad attitude. When isolating to gain control, you may still add a consequence once the child has repented and is ready to receive it. The time it requires is dependent on the child. If you were using isolation as a consequence, you would give a prescribed period of time that the child would miss out on an activity or social interaction. So in the example above of a complaining child, she may need to sit for a few minutes until she repents of her complaining and has a willing heart to do her chores cheerfully. Isolation is not the consequence – it’s just necessary to help her to change her attitude. As a consequence for the attitude itself, I may add extra chores to give her practice in serving the family without complaining. If my child is angry and complaining because he lost a game with his siblings, isolation can be given as a consequence and would mean sitting quietly elsewhere while the other kids continued to play without him.

• Logical Consequences – Giving extra chores to a child who needs to learn to work without complaining is an example of a logical consequence. Whenever possible we should choose things related to the issue at hand. If a child is unwilling to correct his attitude, it is appropriate to remove a privilege until he can bring it under control. If it takes a long time for him to do this, you may pull a privilege entirely. This is especially helpful when working on rebellious attitudes. I refused to take my kids out in public if they were giving me a lot of attitude at home. I let them know that the outing would be cancelled until I could trust them to show proper attitudes. Since you don’t want to punish all for the attitude of one, find a way to sideline the offending party while still allowing the others to participate. This might include requiring a child to sit by you while the others are allowed to play at the playground or go swimming.

• Chastisement – “The rod and reproof give wisdom…” Proverbs 29:15.  For young children, acts and attitudes of rebellion can be corrected with a biblical chastisement. For more on this tool see Session 12 of Growing Kids God’s Way or  https://growingfamilies.life/parenting-from-the-tree-of-lifeblog/2018/6/1/lsv17-15s-more-correction-options

For discipline to be complete, parents must take the time to instruct and correct wrong attitudes, as well as wrong behavior, in our children. By doing so, we will help them to gain victory over the sin in their lives. We will effectively train them in wisdom and they will be happier themselves, a joy to us, and a blessing to others. We also recommend this post from Beth Blunk on pursuing loving relationship with your child in the midst of discerning when to focus on attitude.

Beth Ann Plumberg and her husband Chuck are parents to 4 wonderful sons and daughters-in-love and grandparents to 5 adorable grandchildren. They have taught parenting classes since 1993. They enjoy reading, history and family research and live with 2 cats full-time on the road in their travel trailer. 

As parents, we are keenly aware of when our children misbehave. We are quick to give a consequence for a wrong action. When they are little, this is usually enough to restore them to their sweet little selves. As they grow, however, even though we insist on and receive right behavior, we are often left with bad attitudes and a grudging obedience. We know we should get to their hearts, but how? What are we missing?

From the beginning, we teach our children right actions and right attitudes. Behaviors can be motivated by the sin nature (foolishness) or by innocent or ignorant ideas about how the world works (childishness). The child’s attitude reflects his motivations. We know we are getting to a child’s heart when we see right attitudes as well as right behavior. We should see both.

The problem is, we don’t correct for both. Carla Link is fond of saying “As parents we have a tendency to correct for wrong behavior and remind for wrong attitudes.” I have found this to be true in my own parenting. The result is we get right action with a bad attitude. We need to discipline both action AND attitude if we truly desire to reach the hearts of our children. How then, should we address our children’s attitudes?

As you read this post and Part 2, consider also that what we’re after is relationship and connection with our children’s hearts. Sometimes this means looking past an attitude and seeing the person before us through God’s tender eyes. This post from Beth Blunk delves more into this topic.

• Proactively Teach God’s Word

“For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”    Hebrews 4:12 

It is impossible to truly work on attitude apart from the Word of God. God’s Word gives us insight into “the thoughts and intentions of the heart.” On the positive side of discipline, this involves character training, i.e. instructing our children in what to do, as well as what not to do.  What does God require of us? We taught our boys to “put off” the wrong attitudes and to “put on” righteous attitudes. (See Ephesians 4 and Colossians 3) Regular instruction in God’s standards gave us a starting place when correction became necessary. Our boys already knew the ideal and could better assess their attitudes in light of it.

• Promote Right Attitudes

Encourage and praise your children when they demonstrate right attitudes and character qualities. Say things like, “Thank you for clearing the breakfast table so cheerfully.” “I noticed how patient and kind you were when helping your little brother just now.” As often as you can, genuinely praise your children for demonstrating excellent character. It will go a long way toward boosting morale and promoting continued good attitudes.

We should also be mindful as parents to model right attitudes in our homes. Our children will pick up on our attitudes, good or bad, and mirror them. There were times I sought the forgiveness of my children for my own angry words or harsh tone or a complaining spirit when we were stuck in traffic. I wanted my children to know that I, too, had to obey God’s standards and I wasn’t asking them to do something I was unwilling to do myself. They will follow our example so we must show them how to live the things we teach them.

• Promptly Correct

Before it comes out in wrong actions, a bad attitude often reveals itself in a person’s countenance, eyes, posture, and tone. If our children used the wrong tone or rolled their eyes, they were immediately corrected for it. Not allowing it to continue further gives the child the best opportunity to gain self-control over his will and emotions. Take a bad attitude on early and you will have less correction down the road. Once when my 12-year-old son gave a flippant response to my husband, I quickly stopped him and asked him if it was his desire to show honor or dishonor to his dad.  My question made him consider his tone and words in light of the biblical truth he had been taught. He repented and was able to reword his response and engage his dad in a humble, respectful manner. By addressing his tone immediately with a biblical reproof, my son was able to gain self-control and choose the right course of action without needing further correction.

In part two, we’ll look at the tools we have available to us for correcting a bad attitude.

Beth Ann Plumberg and her husband Chuck are parents to 4 wonderful sons and daughters-in-love and grandparents to 5 adorable grandchildren. They have taught parenting classes since 1993. They enjoy reading, history and family research and live with 2 cats full-time on the road in their travel trailer.