3.2.- RED DE AGUAS PLUVIALES
14 INSTALACIÓN DE FONTANERÍA Y SANEAMIENTO IFA Acometidas
Parents to Become Acquainted With Children—Some parents do not understand their children and are not really acquainted with them. There is often a great distance between parents and children. If the parents would enter more fully into the feelings of their children and draw out what is in their hearts, it would have a beneficial influence upon them.1
The father and the mother should work together in full sympathy with each other. They should make themselves companions to their children.2
Parents should study the best and most successful manner of winning the love and confidence of their children, that they may lead them in the right path. They should reflect the sunshine of love upon the household.3
Encouragement and Commendation—Young children love companionship and can seldom enjoy themselves alone. They yearn for sympathy and tenderness. That which they enjoy they think will please mother also, and it is natural for them to go to her with their little joys and sorrows. The mother should not wound their sensitive hearts by treating with indifference matters that, though trifling to her, are of great importance to them. Her sympathy and approval are precious. An approving glance, a word of encouragement or commendation, will be like sunshine in their hearts, often making the whole day happy.4
Parents to Be Child’s Confidants—Parents should encourage their children to confide in them and unburden
1Testimonies for the Church 1:396.
2Manuscript 45, 1912.
3The Review and Herald, August 30, 1881.
4The Ministry of Healing, 388.
to them their heart griefs, their little daily annoyances and trials.5 Kindly instruct them and bind them to your hearts. It is a critical time for children. Influences will be thrown around them to wean them from you which you must counteract. Teach them to make you their confidant. Let them whisper in your ear their trials and joys.6
Children would be saved from many evils if they would be more familiar with their parents. Parents should encourage in their children a disposition to be open and frank with them, to come to them with their difficulties and, when they are perplexed as to what course is right, to lay the matter just as they view it before the parents and ask their advice. Who are so well calculated to see and point out their dangers as godly parents? Who can understand the peculiar temperaments of their own children as well as they? The mother who has watched every turn of the mind from infancy, and is thus acquainted with the natural disposition, is best prepared to counsel her children. Who can tell as well what traits of character to check and restrain as the mother, aided by the father?7
“No Time”—“No time,” says the father; “I have no time to give to the training of my children, no time for social and domestic enjoyments.” Then you should not have taken upon yourself the responsibility of a family. By withholding from them the time which is justly theirs, you rob them of the education which they should have at your hands. If you have children, you have a work to do, in union with the mother, in the formation of their characters.8
It is the cry of many mothers: “I have no time to be with my children.” Then for Christ’s sake spend less
5Testimonies for the Church 1:391.
6Ibid., 387.
7Ibid., 392.
8Fundamentals of Christian Education, 65, 66.
time on your dress. Neglect if you will to adorn your apparel. Neglect to receive and make calls. Neglect to cook an endless variety of dishes. But never, never neglect your children. What is the chaff to the wheat? Let nothing interpose between you and the best interests of your children.9
Burdened with many cares, mothers sometimes feel that they cannot take time patiently to instruct their little ones and give them love and sympathy. But they should remember that if the children do not find in their parents and in their home that which will satisfy their desire for sympathy and companionship, they will look to other sources, where both mind and character may be endangered.10
With Your Children in Work and Play—Give some of your leisure hours to your children; associate with them in their work and in their sports, and win their confidence. Cultivate their friendship.11
Let parents devote the evenings to their families. Lay off care and perplexity with the labors of the day.12
Counsel to Reserved, Dictatorial Parents—There is danger of both parents and teachers commanding and dictating too much, while they fail to come sufficiently into social relation with their children or scholars. They often hold themselves too much reserved and exercise their authority in a cold, unsympathizing manner which cannot win the hearts of their children and pupils. If they would gather the children close to them and show that they love them, and would manifest an interest in all their efforts and even in their sports, sometimes even being a child among children, they would make the children very happy and would gain their love and win their
9The Signs of the Times, April 3, 1901.
10The Ministry of Healing, 389.
11Counsels to Teachers, Parents, and Students, 124.
12Christian Temperance and Bible Hygiene, 65.
confidence. And the children would sooner respect and love the authority of their parents and teachers.13
Evil Associates as Competitors of the Home—Satan and his host are making most powerful efforts to sway the minds of the children, and they must be treated with candor, Christian tenderness, and love.
This will give you a strong influence over them, and they will feel that they can repose unlimited confidence in you. Throw around your children the charms of home and of your society. If you do this, they will not have so much desire for the society of young associates....
Because of the evils now in the world, and the restriction necessary to be placed upon the children, parents should have double care to bind them to their hearts and let them see that they wish to make them happy.14
Parents to Be Acquainted With Their Children—No barrier of coldness and reserve should be allowed to arise between parents and children. Let parents become acquainted with their children, seeking to understand their tastes and dispositions, entering into their feelings, and drawing out what is in their hearts.
Parents, let your children see that you love them and will do all in your power to make them happy. If you do so, your necessary restrictions will have far greater weight in their young minds. Rule your children with tenderness and compassion, remembering that
“their angels do always behold the face of My Father which is in heaven.” If you desire the angels to do for your children the work given them of God, co-operate with them by doing your part.
Brought up under the wise and loving guidance of a true home, children will have no desire to wander away
13Testimonies for the Church 3:134, 135.
14Ibid. 1:387, 388.
in search of pleasure and companionship. Evil will not attract them.
The spirit that prevails in the home will mold their characters; they will form habits and principles that will be a strong defense against temptation when they shall leave the home shelter and take their place in the world.15
15The Ministry of Healing, 394.
Chap. Thirty-One - Security Through Love
The Power of Love’s Ministry—Love’s agencies have wonderful power, for they are divine. The soft answer that “turneth away wrath,”
the love that “suffereth long, and is kind,” the charity that “covereth a multitude of sins”—would we learn the lesson, with what power for healing would our lives be gifted! How life would be transformed and the earth become a very likeness and foretaste of heaven!
These precious lessons may be so simply taught as to be understood even by little children. The heart of the child is tender and easily impressed; and when we who are older become “as little children,” when we learn the simplicity and gentleness and tender love of the Saviour, we shall not find it difficult to touch the hearts of the little ones and teach them love’s ministry of healing.1
From a worldly point of view, money is power; but from the Christian standpoint, love is power. Intellectual and spiritual strength are involved in this principle. Pure love has special efficacy to do good, and can do nothing but good. It prevents discord and misery and brings the truest happiness. Wealth is often an influence to corrupt and destroy; force is strong to do hurt; but truth and goodness are the properties of pure love.2
Love Is a Plant to Be Nourished—Home is to be the center of the purest and most elevated affection. Peace, harmony, affection, and happiness should be perseveringly cherished every day, until these precious things abide in the hearts of those who compose the family.
The
1Education, 114.
2Testimonies for the Church 4:138.
plant of love must be carefully nourished, else it will die. Every good principle must be cherished if we would have it thrive in the soul.
That which Satan plants in the heart—envy, jealousy, evil surmising, evil speaking, impatience, prejudice, selfishness, covetousness, and vanity—must be uprooted. If these evil things are allowed to remain in the soul, they will bear fruit by which many shall be defiled. Oh, how many cultivate the poisonous plants that kill out the precious fruits of love and defile the soul!3
Remember Your Own Childhood—Do not treat your children only with sternness, forgetting your own childhood and forgetting that they are but children. Do not expect them to be perfect or try to make them men and women in their acts at once. By so doing, you will close the door of access which you might otherwise have to them and will drive them to open a door for injurious influences, for others to poison their young minds before you awake to their danger....
Parents should not forget their childhood years, how much they yearned for sympathy and love, and how unhappy they felt when censured and fretfully chided. They should be young again in their feelings, and bring their minds down to understand the wants of their children.4
They need gentle, encouraging words. How easy it is for mothers to speak words of kindness and affection which will send a sunbeam to the hearts of the little ones, causing them to forget their troubles!5
Parents, give your children love: love in babyhood, love in childhood, love in youth. Do not give them frowns, but ever keep a sunshiny countenance.6
3The Signs of the Times, June 20, 1911.
4Testimonies for the Church 1:387, 388.
5The Review and Herald, July 9, 1901.
6Manuscript 129, 1898.
Keep Children in a Sunny Atmosphere—The little ones must be carefully soothed when in trouble. Children between babyhood and manhood and womanhood do not generally receive the attention that they should have. Mothers are needed who will so guide their children that they will regard themselves as a part of the family. Let the mother talk with her children regarding their hopes and their perplexities. Let parents remember that their children are to be cared for in preference to strangers. They are to be kept in a sunny atmosphere, under the mother’s guidance.7
Help your children to gain victories.... Surround them with an atmosphere of love. Thus you can subdue their stubborn dispositions.8 When Children Need Love Rather Than Food—Many mothers shamefully neglect their children that they may gain time to embroider the clothing or to put needless trimming upon the little garments of their children. When the children are tired and really need their care, they are neglected or given something to eat. They not only did not need the food but it was a positive injury to them. What they did need was the mother’s soothing embrace. Every mother should have time to give her children these little endearments which are so essential during infancy and childhood. In this way the mother would bind up the children’s hearts and happiness with her own. She is to them what God is to us.9
Reasonable Desires to Be Gratified—You should ever impress upon your children the fact that you love them; that you are laboring for their interest; that their happiness is dear to you; and that you design to do only
7Manuscript 127, 1998.
8Manuscript 114, 1903.
9Manuscript 43, 1900.
that which is for their good. You should gratify their little wants whenever you can reasonably do so.10
Never act from impulse in governing children. Let authority and affection be blended. Cherish and cultivate all that is good and lovely, and lead them to desire the higher good by revealing Christ to them.
While you deny them those things that would be an injury to them, let them see that you love them and want to make them happy. The more unlovely they are, the greater pains you should take to reveal your love for them. When the child has confidence that you want to make him happy, love will break every barrier down. This is the principle of the Saviour’s dealing with man; it is the principle that must be brought into the church.11
Love Should Be Expressed—In many families there is a great lack in expressing affection one for another. While there is no need of sentimentalism, there is need of expressing love and tenderness in a chaste, pure, dignified way. Many absolutely cultivate hardness of heart and in word and action reveal the satanic side of the character.
Tender affection should ever be cherished between husband and wife, parents and children, brothers and sisters. Every hasty word should be checked, and there should not be even the appearance of the lack of love one for another. It is the duty of everyone in the family to be pleasant, to speak kindly.12
Cultivate tenderness, affection, and love that have expression in little courtesies, in speech, in thoughtful attentions.13
The best way to educate children to respect their father and mother is to give them the opportunity of seeing the father offering kindly attentions to the mother and the mother rendering respect and reverence to the father.
10Testimonies for the Church 4:140.
11Manuscript 4, 1993.
12The Signs of the Times, November 14, 1892.
13The Youth´s Instructor, April 21, 1886.
It is by beholding love in their parents that children are led to obey the fifth commandment and to heed the injunction, “Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right.”14
The Love of Jesus to Be Mirrored in the Parents—When the mother has gained the confidence of her children and taught them to love and obey her, she has given them the first lesson in the Christian life. They must love and trust and obey their Saviour as they love and trust and obey their parents. The love which in faithful care and right training the parent manifests for the child faintly mirrors the love of Jesus for His faithful people.15
14The Review and Herald, November 15, 1892.
15The Signs of the Times, April 4, 1911.
Chap. Thirty-Two - Preoccupy the Garden of the Heart
Parents as Gardeners—The Lord has entrusted to parents a solemn, sacred work. They are to cultivate carefully the soil of the heart. Thus they may be laborers together with God. He expects them to guard and tend carefully the garden of their children’s hearts. They are to sow the good seed, weeding out every unsightly weed. Every defect in character, every fault in disposition, needs to be cut away; for if allowed to remain, these will mar the beauty of the character.1
Parents, your own home is the first field in which you are called to labor. The precious plants in the home garden demand your first care. To you it is appointed to watch for souls as they that must give account. Carefully consider your work, its nature, its bearing, and its results.2
You have before your own door a little plot of ground to care for, and God will hold you responsible for this work which He has left in your hands.3
Tending the Garden—The prevailing influence in the world is to suffer the youth to follow the natural turn of their own minds. And if very wild in youth, parents say they will come right after a while and, when sixteen or eighteen years of age, will reason for themselves and leave off their wrong habits and become at last useful men and women. What a mistake! For years they permit an enemy to sow the garden of the heart; they suffer wrong principles
1Manuscript 138, 1898.
2The Signs of the Times, July 1, 1886.
3The Review and Herald, September 15, 1891.
to grow, and in many cases all the labor afterward bestowed on that soil will avail nothing....
Some parents have suffered their children to form wrong habits, the marks of which may be seen all through life. Upon the parents lies this sin. These children may profess to be Christians; yet without a special work of grace upon the heart and a thorough reform in life, their past habits will be seen in all their experience, and they will exhibit just the character which their parents allowed them to form.4
The young should not be suffered to learn good and evil indiscriminately, with the idea that at some future time the good will predominate and the evil lose its influence. The evil will increase faster than the good. It is possible that after many years the evil they have learned may be eradicated; but who will venture this? Time is short. It is easier and much safer to sow clean, good seed in the hearts of your children than to pluck up the weeds afterward. Impressions made upon the minds of the young are hard to efface. How important, then, that these impressions be of the right sort, that the elastic faculties of youth be bent in the right direction.5
Seed Sowing, Weeding—In the earliest years of the child’s life the soil of the heart should be carefully prepared for the showers of God’s grace. Then the seeds of truth are to be carefully sown and diligently tended. And God, who rewards every effort made in His name, will put life into the seed sown; and there will appear first the blade, then
Seed Sowing, Weeding—In the earliest years of the child’s life the soil of the heart should be carefully prepared for the showers of God’s grace. Then the seeds of truth are to be carefully sown and diligently tended. And God, who rewards every effort made in His name, will put life into the seed sown; and there will appear first the blade, then