31 Bible Verses about Nurture

And you, fathers, do not irritate your children, but bring them up tenderly with true Christian training and advice.

Fathers, do not fret and harass your children, or you may make them sullen and morose.

For I recall the sincere faith which is in your heart--a faith which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and then in your mother Eunice, and, I am fully convinced, now dwells in you also.

and that from infancy you have known the sacred writings which are able to make you wise to obtain salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.

On the contrary, in our relations to you we showed ourselves as gentle as a mother is when she tenderly nurses her own children. Seeing that we were thus drawn affectionately towards you, it would have been a joy to us to have imparted to you not only God's Good News, but to have given our very lives also, because you had become very dear to us. For you remember, brethren, our labour and toil: how, working night and day so as not to become a burden to any one of you, we came and proclaimed among you God's Good News.read more.
You yourselves are witnesses--and God is witness--how holy and upright and blameless our dealings with you believers were. For you know that we acted towards every one of you as a father does towards his own children, encouraging and cheering you, and imploring you to live lives worthy of fellowship with God who is inviting you to share His own Kingship and glory.

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus asked Simon Peter, "Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these others do?" "Yes, Master," was his answer; "you know that you are dear to me." "Then feed my lambs," replied Jesus. Again a second time He asked him, "Simon, son of John, do you love me?" "Yes, Master," he said, "you know that you are dear to me." "Then be a shepherd to my sheep," He said. A third time Jesus put the question: "Simon, son of John, am I dear to you?" It grieved Peter that Jesus asked him the third time, "Am I dear to you?" "Master," he replied, "you know everything, you can see that you are dear to me." "Then feed my much-loved sheep," said Jesus.

Upon their arrival he said to them, "You Elders well know, from the first day of my setting foot in the province of Asia, the kind of life I lived among you the whole time, serving the Lord in all humility, and with tears, and amid trials which came upon me through the plotting of the Jews-- and that I never shrank from declaring to you anything that was profitable, or from teaching you in public and in your homes,

I am not writing all this to shame you, but I am offering you advice as my dearly-loved children. For even if you were to have ten thousand spiritual instructors--for all that you could not have several fathers. It is I who in Christ Jesus became your father through the Good News.

while night and day, with intense earnestness, we pray that we may see your faces, and may bring to perfection whatever may be still lacking in your faith?

holding fast to the faithful Message which he has received, so that he may be well qualified both to encourage others with sound teaching and to reply successfully to opponents.

So I exhort the Elders among you--I who am their fellow Elder and have been an eye-witness of the sufferings of the Christ, and am also a sharer in the glory which is soon to be revealed. Be shepherds of God's flock which is among you. Exercise the oversight not reluctantly but eagerly, in accordance with the will of God; not for base gain but with cheerful minds; not lording it over your Churches but proving yourselves patterns for the flock to imitate.

In the same way exhort the younger men to be discreet, and above all make your own life a pattern of right conduct, having in your teaching no taint of insincerity, but a serious tone,

No one's silver or gold or clothing have I coveted. You yourselves know that these hands of mine have provided for my own necessities and for the people with me. In all things I have set you an example, showing you that, by working as I do, you ought to help the weak, and to bear in mind the words of the Lord Jesus, how He Himself said, "'It is more blessed to give than to receive.'"

I entreat you therefore to become like me. For this reason I have sent Timothy to you. Spiritually he is my dearly-loved and faithful child. He will remind you of my habits as a Christian teacher--the manner in which I teach everywhere in every Church.

Be imitators of me, in so far as I in turn am an imitator of Christ.

The doctrines and the line of conduct which I taught you--both what you heard and what you saw in me-- hold fast to them; and God who gives peace will be with you.

The Good News that we brought you did not come to you in words only, but also with power and with the Holy Spirit and with much certainty, for you know the sort of men we became among you, as examples for your sakes. And you followed the pattern set you by us and by the Master, after you had received the Message amid severe persecution, and yet with the joy which the Holy Spirit gives,

And we exhort you, brethren, admonish the unruly, comfort the timid, sustain the weak, and be patient towards all. See to it that no one ever repays another with evil for evil; but always seek opportunities of doing good both to one another and to all the world.

I now pass to another subject. Receive as a friend a man whose faith is weak, but not for the purpose of deciding mere matters of opinion.

But take care lest this liberty of yours should prove a hindrance to the progress of weak believers. For if any one were to see you, who know the real truth of this matter, reclining at table in an idol's temple, would not his conscience (supposing him to be a weak believer) Why, your knowledge becomes the ruin of the weak believer--your brother, for whom Christ died!read more.
Moreover when you thus sin against the brethren and wound their weak consciences, you are, in reality, sinning against Christ. Therefore if what I eat causes my brother to fall, never again to the end of my days will I touch any kind of animal food, for fear I should cause my brother to fall.

Brethren, if anybody be detected in any misconduct, you who are spiritual should restore such a one in a spirit of meekness. And let each of you keep watch over himself, lest he also fall into temptation. Always carry one another's burdens, and so obey the whole of Christ's Law.

Therefore encourage one another, and let each one help to strengthen his friend, as in fact you do.

In the same way exhort aged women to let their conduct be such as becomes consecrated persons. They must not be slanderers nor enslaved to wine-drinking. They must be teachers of what is right. They should school the young women to be affectionate to their husbands and to their children, to be sober-minded, pure in their lives, industrious in their homes, kind, submissive to their husbands, so that the Christian teaching may not be exposed to reproach.

Thirst, like newly-born infants, for pure milk for the soul, that by it you may grow up to salvation;

I fed you with milk and not with solid food, since for this you were not yet strong enough. And even now you are not strong enough:

Brethren, do not prove yourselves to be children in your minds. As regards evil, indeed, be utter babes, but as regards your minds prove yourselves to be men of ripe years.

Concerning Him we have much to say, and much that it would be difficult to make clear to you, since you have become so dull of apprehension. For although, considering the long time you have been believers, you ought now to be teachers of others, you really need some one to teach you over again the very rudiments of the truths of God, and you have come to require milk instead of solid food. By people who live on milk I mean those who are imperfectly acquainted with the teaching concerning righteousness.read more.
Such persons are mere babes. But solid food is for adults--that is, for those who through constant practice have their spiritual faculties carefully trained to distinguish good from evil.

But be always growing in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To Him be all glory, both now and to the day of Eternity!

And all of us, with unveiled faces, reflecting like bright mirrors the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same likeness, from one degree of radiant holiness to another, even as derived from the Lord the Spirit.

But we shall lovingly hold to the truth, and shall in all respects grow up into union with Him who is our Head, even Christ.

Unceasing thanks are due from us to God on your behalf, brethren. They are appropriate because your faith is growing greatly, and the love of every one of you for all the others goes on increasing.