“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.” -Proverbs 3:11–12 ESV
On my day off this week I went with Laura and the kids to Hy-vee where they have miniature shopping carts that fit Sadie Piper and Beckham perfectly. As we walked through the produce section we watched a mother tell her 4 or 5 year old son to put his flip flops on. He refused. When she approached him to tell him more sternly he began to hit and kick her. She responded by stepping back and beginning a standoff with him. She looked at him with anger in her eyes, he looked at her with even more anger in his eyes.
Beckham stopped moving and just watched wide-eyed as this interaction went on. Laura said he does this every time they see something like this in public. I admit I don’t know the whole story of what we witnessed at Hy-vee, but as I watched both of them looking miserable and trying to gain control over the other, it got me thinking that how we discipline our children displays our love for them in a way that really nothing else will.
So while I was reading Proverbs 4 this morning, verses 11 and 12 jumped out to me. It speaks of discipline from our God and tells us that behind discipline is love. It illustrates the discipline of the Lord with the picture of a father’s discipline for his son. Note it speaks of discipline and not punishment. Consider this chart for a better understanding of the difference.
I’m afraid abuses of parents who punish their children both physically and emotionally have been highlighted by the media and has lead to too many Christian parents neglecting to discipline their children in the love and admonition of the Lord.
At the risk of offending people, let me encourage you to consider how you discipline young children. We don’t do it perfectly, but our desire is to glorify God and love for our children and this I believe is communicated to them.
Repetitive Commands
The child is told not to touch something. They keep doing it and the parents keep saying not to touch it with no reinforcement. The child learns that mom and dad’s commands are not to be followed. Or…when the child keeps disobeying, the parents raise their voice to sound angry (often becoming angry as well) and their voice and anger at times will cause enough fear for the child to obey.
Communicated to the child is this: I do something Dad doesn’t want me to do and I don’t need to obey until they get very angry, if at all.
Time Out
I’ve seen how this works. A child is told not to throw a toy, they do and their parent picks them up and takes them to time out. They are told to stay there and the parents puts a space between the child and themselves. The most interesting thing and honestly ridiculous aspects of this are when the child learns they can just walk out of timeout. The parent (or Super Nanny) simply puts them back in time out over and over again. It’s a vicious cycle.
I believe this communicates when you are bad I want you away from me. There is no training of their heart at work.
Spanking
This is what we do having been convinced of it in two ways. One was when we were living in Dallas and Laura was pregnant; we observed people’s children in our church and those whose children were joyful and loving and polite and obedient we asked what they did. All of them spanked their children when they were young. Some suggested a book called On Becoming Babywise by Gary Ezzo (first year), others a book called Shepherding a Child’s Heart (after a year) by Tedd Tripp.
The other reason we spank is because it is biblical.
Proverbs speaks to this form of disciple in many places: Proverbs 24:13″Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.”
Proverbs 22:15 “Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him.”
Proverbs 23:13 “Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you strike him with a rod, he will not die.
We believe spanking is the best and most loving way to discipline our children if done in a biblical manner.
When Beckham (or Sadie Piper, she is not too young to understand how and why we discipline her) knows what is expected of him such as not taking toys from his sister’s hands and does it anyway, we tell him to go get a spoon (we use a wooden cooking spoon so that it is not our direct hand making contact). Usually this upsets him and we help calm him down by talking to him. We ask him what he did and he’ll tell us, “I hit Sadie Piper” or “I argued with mommy” or whatever it is. We’ll ask him what God calls that, he’ll say sin. We’ll help him put a biblical term on it: disobedience, not honoring my mother, anger, selfishness, etc.
It varies, but we’ll ask him something along the lines of , “Who calls you to obey mommy and daddy?” He’ll answer, “God” (Ephesians 6:1, “Children obey your parents in the Lord”). Then we’ll ask why does Daddy (or mommy) spank you? He’ll answer, “Because you love me.” He’s sitting in my lap all this time as I hold him. I’ll spank him and it’s really no big deal as far as pain goes, but I do want it to hurt enough for him to take notice.
Then, and this is why I love this method of discipline, we pray to God together. I lead him and he repeats my words. Something like this, “Dear God, please forgive me for sinning again You, thank you for teaching me to obey (or love or whatever it is). Thank you for forgiving me and loving me. Please help me to obey today and glorify You. In Jesus name I pray, amen.”
The he goes to whoever he sinned against and asks for forgiveness. It may be me or Laura or Sadie Piper. He always asks for forgiveness, they accept it and hug each other. This communicates that when you disobey, I don’t push you away, I pull you towards me because I love you and I want you to find the joy that we experience from obedience to God. Like Proverbs says, I love Beckham, I delight in him and so I discipline him.
Now, our children our sinners, they sin many many times everyday. My child may hit yours, my child may say something very cruel, and he will be disciplined and restored after doing so. As I saw the boy in the standoff with his mother it occurred to me just how miserable they both were from lack of any real discipline. He didn’t feel loved because his mother would not take him outside and discipline him in love, she didn’t train him to obey God. Quite the opposite he saw her anger and he knew he was the object of that anger.
Finally, our children’s parents are sinners and they too sin many many times every single day. We even sin against our children and when we do we go to them and ask for forgiveness, modeling for them that we too are called to a standard set by God and we too fail and we too are forgiven in Christ. In this way, the gospel is preached to us all daily. We are sinners in need of God’s grace and mercy. Praise God for Jesus our Savior!
) and didn’t at all mind going to work every day. But raising our kids has been infinitely more rewarding. I do have to sometimes remind myself, “You are going to miss this…” and today, I think I will be so glad I stopped to appreciate the time we had with Becks home all day.
