Whatever Happened to Obedience?

Somewhere along the way, obedience went out of style. Andrea Vij wants to bring it back.

The light kept going on and off, on and off. I’d put a new lamp in the corner of the master bedroom, and my son had developed a sudden fascination with its floor switch. He was tapping away at it with his bare foot as I watched from the bed. Tap, tap, tap. On and off, on and off … 

“Stop,” I said, exasperated. But he kept tapping—on and off, on and off …  

“Stop!” I said more sharply. 

“Why?”  

“Because I said so!” 

You saw that last line coming, right? I’ll bet every parent has said it, which serves as proof of its rootedness in the parental psyche. Just like our Heavenly Father, we expect our children to obey, even if experience shows that all too often they don’t.  

Growing up, I knew that if Mom or Dad told me to do something, I had to obey, and especially in Dad’s case, to obey FAST. When my second-grade teacher, Sister Frances, taught us about the fourth commandment, she made it clear that honoring your father and mother meant you had to obey them, even when you didn’t understand why. We were called to obey our parents in the same way we were called to obey God.  

From Old School to New Age 

But over the years, I watched obedience go out of style. Nobody wanted to talk about it anymore, and when I got to college, child development “experts” taught us that in modern classrooms, obedience had been replaced by cooperation and self-esteem. Research made it clear, they said, that children learn better from respect and validation than from old-school obedience.  

Years later when my son reached third grade, the idea of “mindfulness” stormed into his public school like a new-age hurricane. Teachers loved their new buzz word, but I had to roll my eyes every time it came up. "Mindfulness" basically took what I’d learned in Catholic school — to stop and pray whenever I felt unsure — and twisted it into a godless way for kids to reflect on their own motivations. The message was clear: Being true to yourself was the best solution, regardless of the problem.  

I couldn’t see it at the time, but the elevation of self had seeped into every corner of life, slowly but surely convincing people who ought to know better that even truth depended on individual experience. Things that had always seemed obvious were suddenly coming into question, including fundamental moral issues. Uncertainty spread far and wide, and even after we moved and enrolled our son in a Catholic school, I overheard his classmates saying things like, “You do you, bro.”  

Obedience didn’t have a chance. 

A Return to Virtue 

It’s high time we got back to obedience — and its old-school companion, humility. Our Heavenly Father created us with these virtues in mind, and as the supreme model of good parenting, He knew from the beginning exactly what His children need. Early on He made the boundaries clear, warning Adam and Eve that a certain tree was off limits to them, and when they disobeyed Him and ate of its fruit, He responded with perfect justice and love.  

As parents, we are called to give our children the same guidance, and while this can present a real challenge in our permissive world, Scripture has given us beautiful models of obedience to follow. From Abraham and Isaac to Moses in the desert, from Mary’s fiat to the humility of Saint Joseph, from Noah’s ark to Jesus in Gethsemane, we can find many great examples of obedience, humility, and trust in God’s word.  

It’s Not About the Lamp 

Our kids won’t learn obedience on their own; we have to teach them, firmly but gently and with lots of love. Fortunately, opportunities to teach obedience come up all the time — for example, in a bedroom with a lamp. On and off, on and off.

“You know,” I told my son with a sigh, “when I tell you to do something, you need to do it right away. This isn’t about the lamp. It’s about respecting your parents.” 

The tapping stopped, and in the silence that followed, my barefoot son ambled toward the bed and sat next to me. “Can I tell you about a funny video I saw?” he asked, deftly changing the subject. 

My heart softened. “Okay, fine.” It seemed like my lesson on obedience had landed, but if it hadn’t, tomorrow would be another day. 

When we teach our kids obedience, we prepare them for a life of humble surrender to God’s will. We also remind ourselves Who is really in charge. (Hint: It isn’t us.) Obedience to God can be difficult, even for parents, but we trust in our Heavenly Father, who always knows what is best for His children. 

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Copyright 2026 Andrea Vij
Images: copyright 2026 Andrea Vij, all rights reserved.