Discipline

For Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Proverbs 23:13-14

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.

"Do not withhold discipline" implies that displine is a necessity for the health of the child. You do not speak of withholding something that you do not have the responsibility to give nor the other does not deserve to have. To withhold discipline is to withhold care; it is to shirk one's responsibility to provide for the welfare, in this case, of one's child. To withhold discipline signals that the parent either the parent does not truly care for the wellbeing of his child or that he is too fearful to carry through on what is right.

It is heartless not to let one's child experience repercussion for his sin. It is cowardly to avoid setting and enforcing rules of behavior. No adult has ever thanked parents for failing to discipline or for not setting boundaries.

Parents can abuse and too often even good parents mishandle discipline. Thus, parents are to continually examine themselves. But they nevertheless cannot escape their reponsibility before God. They must be the ones with an eye to the future, something their children cannot see.

And they must be willing to accept discipline themselves. Do they accept discipline from authorities - government, the workplace, the church? All who have some measure of authority have the same responsibility to exercise discipline. We are all willing, so we say, to accept the discipline of the Lord, but we rarely are willing to accept the Lord's discipline that is meted out through his human instruments. If you expect your children to accept your discipline, let them see you model how that is done.