The Heavenly Father created His children and the garden of Eden for them to live in. The garden of Eden can be considered a paradise. God’s children were able to enjoy all the grace of God in the garden of Eden. From the Garden of Eden, there was also education. As parents, we can learn from the lessons in the Garden of Eden that the Heavenly Father has left behind for us.

1. The Heavenly Father teaches His children to pray to communicate with Him
   This is the most basic but most important teaching.

Gen 1:27
“So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”
Are you able to see God telling His children to communicate with Him through prayers from this verse? All this verse says is that God created Man in His own image. What does this mean? It tells us that the main purpose of God creating Man is not to be servants, because God already created many servants - angels. If Man were created to be servants, He could’ve created them in the image of angels and not in His own image. God created Man in His own image so that they can become His children. He wants His children to have the same image as Him, so that Man is of the same type/类别 as God. We can teach our dog some simple commands and they can follow. But when you have problems and want to talk to somebody, you can’t talk to your dog. The dog may understand that its master is sad but all it can do is droop its tail and sit near him.

Even if you were to speak to the dog, it’s like playing a violin to it. Because we’re not of the same type/类别 so we can’t have deep communication and develop an intimate relationship. Being of the same type/类别 as God allows us to have a deep communication with Him and to develop an intimate relationship. From God creating Man in His own image, we thus understand this to mean that God wants His children to communicate with Him deeply, and this is through prayer.

Isa 45:22-23
“Every knee will bow to Me. Every tongue will swear loyalty to Me.”
If we really believe in God and that we’re children created by Him, we’d be willing to listen and kneel down to pray before Him. This isn’t just an expression of our faith, it also shows our obedience and submission to Him. This is the basic duty of His children. We don’t just come before God in prayer when we have problems. We come before Him to pray as our duty as children.

In a family of God’s children, should not prayer be emphasised? This relates to the salvation of our souls. There’re many types of problems - major and minor. We don’t worry too much about problems that don’t affect our lives so much. But if our lives are at risk, we’d take it seriously. We draw near to God in prayers. This is important because it affects the salvation of our souls. Pitifully, we no longer regard this as so important. We’re busy after other things in the world we deem important, and end up sacrificing the importance of prayer. If we truly understand the importance of prayers and how it affects the salvation of our souls, we won’t dare to neglect it.

Consider Daniel who was more busy than us and whose circumstances were more adverse and complicated than ours, his prayers were not affected. Even though the temple was gone, God’s people were taken captive, his faith in God was unchanged. He was resolved and prayed thrice a day. He didn’t just believe in God, He also believed he was God’s child. There’re many relationships we have to give up, but we cannot give up our relationship with God, because that’ll affect our salvation and eternal life. The enemies tried to harm Daniel due to his prayers. They managed to pass a decree for petitions made to any god or man to be banned for 30 days. Did Daniel allow this risk to his life deter him from praying to God daily? No. He continued to persist kneeling down thrice a day to God. In the end he was cast into the lion’s den. But they weren’t able to swallow him. Through the power of prayer, the lions’ mouths were shut. Peter says that the devil is like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. How are we to resist this? Depending on our own strength, it’s impossible. We need a strong and resilient faith. How do we express a strong faith? Through prayers, maintain our relationship and communication with God. This prayer will have the power to seal the mouths of the lions. Prayers truly affect our salvation and eternal life. We need to adjust our thinking. If we truly believe in God and that we’re His children, we should pray to God daily.

Prayer should not be a part time activity. It should not be some time. Or worse, no time. Instead, prayer should be on time. Full time. Best is if it’s over time. Because adversities and the end of a life can come anytime.

上床不知下床事 You don’t know if you get off your bed after getting on it
出门不知路上事 You don’t know what will happen on the road when you go out

We always say “再见”/“see you tomorrow” but we never know if we will really see each other again. We never know who will leave the world next. Not just old people, young children too. Our life is truly like a mist that can disappear anytime. We love our parents and our children. But we can’t guarantee 上床不知下床事, 出门不知路上事. But this doesn’t lead us to depression. Because we rely on God and trust Him. Although we cannot guarantee our life will continue, we can in prayer entrust our lives to Him.

As parents, don’t you think we need to educate our children to pray together? We don’t know what may happen next. But have you entrusted your life and everything to God? You say you entrust but you don’t kneel down to pray. If you really do entrust your life to Him, kneel down to pray.

Prayer is the first and most important teaching from the Garden of Eden. Sadly many of us have neglected this and many children don’t kneel down to pray. In the previous theolo, some children confess that they don’t pray at home, nor do their parents. The speaker was surprised and sad. We no longer see this as an important aspect of our education. May the Lord help us that through this basic and important teaching, to lead ourselves and our children to pray to Him, for this is the most important thing - maintaining your relationship with God. We expand much money and time on many relationships but what becomes of them? Examine our relationship with God. What relationship will last eternally? Guarantee our salvation? Guarantee entering the heavenly home of ourselves and our children?

1. Our Heavenly Father educates His children to do work in the garden of Eden
   Gen 2:15
   The garden of Eden is a paradise. There is much happiness and enjoyment. But in the garden of Eden, it’s not just a place to eat, drink and make merry. God also gave tasks and work for Man to do; to cultivate and keep this garden. Don’t think God has treated them as servants. The garden belongs to them. That’s why they have the responsibility to cultivate it.

The gardens and roads in Singapore are very clean. The horticulture is very beautiful. Sometimes when flowers and grass grow haphazardly, their beauty is hidden. When we cultivate it then their beauty can truly be shown. Wouldn’t we want to cultivate it? Do you know how much the Singapore government spends to cultivate the plants in Singapore?

The Heavenly Father gave the beautiful garden of Eden to His children. His children have to have the responsibility to cultivate it.

Heb 1:14
The angels are ministering spirits to His children. Why doesn’t God leave the work of cultivating the garden to the angels then? If the angels cultivate the garden, it’ll probably look much better. Because angels don’t get fatigued and aren’t lazy. Man are prone to laziness and cutting corners. God has a myriad of angels to get them to work but He entrusted the duty of cultivating the garden to His children. God wanted His children to understand that while they are given this garden to enjoy, they have the responsibility to take care of it.

If you want to marry off your daughter and find out that the brother is good but turns out to be lazy and irresponsible, what’s the use of having a sweet mouth? “You must be responsible to establish your relationship. You’re so lazy and irresponsible. How can I entrust my daughter in your hands?”

You would want your potential daughter in law to be pretty and smart. But you find out she’s lazy and irresponsible. You wouldn’t want your son to marry her, because she wouldn’t help you to establish but disrupt your family.

When someone is applying for a job, their academic results may be good. But later you’re warned that this person is lazy and irresponsible. Even if the academic results are good, you’d think twice about hiring him!

Whether at home, work, or in relationships between people, the virtue of responsibility is so important. That’s why God wanted His children to be responsible, and He trained them by giving them tasks.

We must learn from His education. Although we may have the money to employ maids, require our children to do their part of work at home; to understand what their responsibility to this house is from young. Through work your child can understand what work he’s responsible for. Then in the future you won’t be worried. If you don’t cultivate them, next time when you ask them for help they’d say, “This is my responsibility meh?”

Then you’d realise that you’ve neglected a very important aspect of education. Maybe you say now that “Oh he’s very busy now. He should focus on his studies.” In every family, every member is busy over his own things. But we can’t let our busyness let us neglect our responsibilities. We share this common blessing and burden. We can’t be too individualistic and just care about ourselves. Regardless of how busy they are with their studies, we still need to educate them to know their responsibilities towards their home. The home is not a hotel; in a hotel you just stay, you don’t need to clean the room. In the home you stay, but must learn to care for your own room. The home is not a restaurant; people serve you in a restaurant, but at home we don’t wait for people to serve us. We must learn to serve others and help each other.

If we’re just waiting for others to serve us then we’re just breeding grievances against each other. We need to teach our children the home is not a hotel or a restaurant. You can eat and stay but there are also responsibilities. Home is paradise but God doesn’t want us to just enjoy the bliss of the garden of Eden and not know the responsibilities we have.

1. The Heavenly Father educates His children to maintain discipline and to execute punishment when needed
   Gen 2:16-17
   God told Adam what he could and couldn’t do right from the beginning. He also told them what punishment they’d meet if they violated this. When Adam and Eve violated God’s command, God punished them accordingly. Was God too harsh?

This is the education we must learn from our Heavenly Father to educate our children the dos and don’ts as a Christian. Help them to understand why they can’t do this and that. Help them to understand why their cousins can do this but they can’t.
“Issit because their mother loves them more that’s why they can do that and we can’t?”
“It’s because they don’t believe in Jesus.”
We must explain to them. We don’t just tell them they can’t do it. We need to tell them WHY. They may forget so we have to say it again. This is not being long winded. Peter too said he had already said this but still saw the need to remind the believers again. Is it because old then become long winded?”

Besides explaining why something is wrong. We must explain the consequences of doing something wrong. When children do wrong, some parents will have a tender heart and decide not to beat the children. The wife will say, “Aiya he already said sorry don’t beat him ah if not I beat you!”

The speaker says that his siblings are not scared of his mother, but they are scared of him lol. Because even though the mother threatens to beat them if they’re naughty, the slipper never touches them. But when the speaker threatens to beat them if they’re naughty, he really will beat them! Funnily his mother approves when he disciplines his younger brothers but disapproves when he disciplines his younger sister “你只有一个妹妹。需要那么凶吗?!”

We must execute the punishment of wrongdoings. Not only do we need to know we’re wrong and apologise. We also need to accept the punishment. We can say, “Now that you’ve understood and apologised. I must still punish you but I can lessen your punishment. After hearing your explanation I understand your POV but what you did was still wrong. I’ll let you choose whether you deserve 1, 3, or 5 strokes.”

He’ll think: “Hm 1 stroke seems to little. 5 strokes is too much! I’ll choose 3.” He’ll willingly/甘心乐意 accept his punishment. He’ll know his wrong, and he won’t murmur against us. He’ll know that we were reasonable in our discipline.

Many times we discipline our children according to our emotions and temper. When we’re in a good mood, “Aiya let him go”. When we’re in a bad mood, every small thing kena punished. The child will be very confused at your inconsistency. He won’t respect you. Instead he’ll learn how to manipulate you. He’ll see your emotions and countenance.

When you’re angry and scold and beat, and use very harsh words, it’ll hurt his self esteem. As a parent you may think: “Why doesn’t he love me? I give him money and food.” We must understand that while our children want money and food, they also want to be respected. They want our true concern and respect for them. But we seldom show sincere concern for them and how to respect them. Especially when you’re angry. You just grab them and scold them. If this happens repeatedly you hurt their self-esteem.

Some parents scold their child, “Jialiaobi!” which means good for nothing person in dialect. “You’re nothing compared to the son of the speaker!” Is this saying right? Lollollol no because the speaker has no kids. Don’t compare your kid to other kids.

If your wife says to you, “Look at the husband of blablabla. So much better than you!” As a husband, would you like to hear such things? It’ll hurt your self-esteem. If your husband says to you, “Other people’s wives so much better than you! Why can’t you be like that?” As wives, do you like your husband to compare you to another woman? It hurts our self-esteem. We don’t like it.

But we do this to our own children very often. By so doing we hurt their self-esteem. We have to be careful of this as it may have adverse results.

This is why Paul tells us we must discipline our children in the Lord. We must have them understand we love and respect them. It’s because of love and respect we don’t want them to continue in their wrong. That’s why we need to punish them.

Not just children. Us adults also need punishment. People often ridicule Singapore to be a pay and pay country. Litter? Get fined. Spit? Get fined. Last time, slogans were put up but people still littered and spat. Only when the government imposed fines then people obeyed. For adults talking also may not work. We need to be punished to wake up.

But an important thing to learn is that when God executed His punishment, He first asked Adam, “Where are you?” (Gen 3:9) They tried to hide. But God took the initiative to find them. “Where are you?” They said, “We’re afraid and have hid.”

Do you think God is just acting? “Since you know I’ve done wrong just punish me lah!” Seems like God is just putting on a show. No. It’s the education of God. He was allowing them to explain themselves; giving them the opportunity to confess their wrongs. If they did, God would certainly lighten the punishment. But they didn’t. They pushed away their wrong off themselves until the wrong was pushed onto God. “It’s your fault for creating us. Why did you create this forbidden fruit? It’s a setup from you!” They put the blame on Him. Before that: “Ah everything is so good and a grace! This woman is the bone of my bones, flesh of my flesh!” Now: “Wah God why you give me this woman that caused me to sin?”

Many sinners put the blame on God. When Adam and Eve did this, God had to punish them.

When we punish our children, first give them the opportunity to confess their wrong. But stubborn children, we have no choice but to execute the punishment, in the hope they’d repent.

When God drove Adam and Eve out of Eden it seemed heartless. But who knew God prepared salvation by coming in the flesh to die for all men so that sinners can all repent and be saved. We can truly see the true love of God.

May God guide us to learn from the education of the Heavenly Father.

518 They That Sow in Tears 流泪撒种

Parenting is really like this - sowing in tears. Sometimes the tears are more than the joy. Children may not be able to see how much their parents do for them, and how they hurt their parents. Adam wasn’t able to see this. He could only see the punishment of God. He didn’t see that God had planned to come in the flesh to die for all on the cross so they can be saved. The Heavenly Father sees and understands our pain. As long as we learn the education of the Heavenly Father, He’ll help us because He knows we want to save the children we’re educating. We desire for their souls to return to the Heavenly Father. This is His work. We work together with Him so all of us can enter heaven together. Not one will be left behind. So we need to sow in tears. If not how can there be reaping in joy? Don’t just enjoy the present and not understand there are tears in the future. Instead, have tears now so that we can enjoy in the future.

So that every child can be saved. Because every soul that we have is so precious.