43 Bible Verses about Fathers Being Mean To Children

Ephesians 6:4 ESV / 20 helpful votes

Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Colossians 3:21 ESV / 13 helpful votes

Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged.

Proverbs 22:6 ESV / 10 helpful votes

Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.

Psalm 103:13 ESV / 8 helpful votes

As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him.

1 Corinthians 11:3 ESV / 5 helpful votes

But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God.

Proverbs 23:24 ESV / 5 helpful votes

The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice; he who fathers a wise son will be glad in him.

Proverbs 13:24 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.

Proverbs 1:8 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Hear, my son, your father's instruction, and forsake not your mother's teaching,

Psalm 127:3-5 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.

2 Timothy 3:16-17 ESV / 4 helpful votes

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.

1 Timothy 5:8 ESV / 4 helpful votes

But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.

Exodus 20:12 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

1 Peter 3:7 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

Hebrews 12:7 ESV / 3 helpful votes

It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline?

Ephesians 6:1-4 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.” Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Ephesians 6:1-3 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.”

Malachi 4:6 ESV / 3 helpful votes

And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.”

Proverbs 10:1 ESV / 3 helpful votes

The proverbs of Solomon. A wise son makes a glad father, but a foolish son is a sorrow to his mother.

Proverbs 3:11-12 ESV / 3 helpful votes

My son, do not despise the Lord's discipline or be weary of his reproof, for the Lord reproves him whom he loves, as a father the son in whom he delights.

Psalm 23:1-6 ESV / 3 helpful votes

A Psalm of David. The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. ...

Deuteronomy 11:19 ESV / 3 helpful votes

You shall teach them to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.

Deuteronomy 4:9 ESV / 3 helpful votes

“Only take care, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Make them known to your children and your children's children—

Genesis 3:16 ESV / 3 helpful votes

To the woman he said, “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children. Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you.”

Genesis 2:24 ESV / 3 helpful votes

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

Hebrews 12:9 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live?

Titus 2:4-5 ESV / 2 helpful votes

And so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled.

2 Timothy 1:5 ESV / 2 helpful votes

I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well.

1 Timothy 2:1-15 ESV / 2 helpful votes

First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, ...

Ephesians 4:32 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

John 3:16 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

John 3:16-17 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

Proverbs 29:17 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Discipline your son, and he will give you rest; he will give delight to your heart.

Proverbs 29:15 ESV / 2 helpful votes

The rod and reproof give wisdom, but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother.

Proverbs 23:22 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Listen to your father who gave you life, and do not despise your mother when she is old.

Proverbs 23:13-14 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you strike him with a rod, he will not die. If you strike him with the rod, you will save his soul from Sheol.

Psalm 139:13-16 ESV / 2 helpful votes

For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them.

Joshua 1:9 ESV / 2 helpful votes

Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”

Deuteronomy 21:18-21 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother, and, though they discipline him, will not listen to them, then his father and his mother shall take hold of him and bring him out to the elders of his city at the gate of the place where he lives, and they shall say to the elders of his city, ‘This our son is stubborn and rebellious; he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ Then all the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones. So you shall purge the evil from your midst, and all Israel shall hear, and fear.

Deuteronomy 6:6-7 ESV / 2 helpful votes

And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.

Deuteronomy 6:6-9 ESV / 2 helpful votes

And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

Deuteronomy 6:5-9 ESV / 2 helpful votes

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

Exodus 21:15 ESV / 2 helpful votes

“Whoever strikes his father or his mother shall be put to death.

Genesis 18:19 ESV / 2 helpful votes

For I have chosen him, that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring to Abraham what he has promised him.”

Suggest a Verse


Visit the Bible online to search for words if you don’t know the specific passage your’re looking for.