We are continuing with our investigation of the gap
between the pinnacle of genuine faith, and the pit
of unbelief.
The “pain” in the presence of discipline is rarely
corporal. For those of us born in the Baby
Boom generation, or earlier, corporal punishment was a matter of
fact. School principals were known to keep
a paddle in their desks for the more rowdy trespassers among us. A “paddling” was affectionately known as applying
the board of education to the seat of knowledge. These days spanking your child will result in
a visit from child services, or the police.
In some cases it could be grounds for divorce – a child “emancipating”
from abusive parents.
The writer of Hebrews states the obvious, that earthly
parents disciplined us early in life, doing the best they knew how. Of course, that “best” is far from
perfect. No human parent is prepared for
the complexities of raising another human.
Attempting to correct unacceptable behavior, or faulty thinking that
will lead to harm for the child, is a minefield; too much, or too little
attention, choice of words, or description of consequences, can have the opposite
effect of that which was intended. It is
difficult, at best, to know what to do.
Parenting! There
are as many opinions on the subject as there are people. And human opinions are useful, because they’re
often based upon human experience, most of which will have been formed out of
painful moments of failure. Our culture
has deduced that pain is the enemy, and children should be spared pain, including
discipline. But God’s Word declares that
to be a false understanding of the nature of growing. The writer to the Hebrews acknowledges how discipline
may be a source of transitory discomfort, but the training for life which it produces
is a peaceful harvest of right living.
My mother was an
expert at allowing pain to instruct. A prime
example that stands out in my mind was when I was only six-years-old. Up to that point, all my clothes had buttons –
never a zipper. Then came the light
jacket with a zipper. Mom was getting me
out the door to catch the bus, and helped me into the windbreaker. But when she went for the zipper, I pushed
her hand away, announcing that I was a big boy now, and I would be doing the
zipper. With that, Mom backed-off and
let me struggle fiercely with getting the two sides of my jacket together. There were some interesting and frustrating moments
of lack of coordination that we shall not bother describing, but the end is a
priceless lesson which stands out after nearly 7 decades. When I finally gave up trying to get the
demonic zipper device hooked together, Mom was right there. With a smile (and probably a stifled laugh) she
calmly, slowly showed me how to put the zipper parts together. She got it started, then stopped and
said: OK, now you finish it. To this day I can never zip a zipper without
thinking of Mom’s kind face.
The Hebrew writer
was right – for a six-year-old, stubborn boy, learning your limits, and how to
accept discipline, was painful. But I found
more that day than zipper wisdom – I harvested a lesson of peaceful parenting.
For You Today
Training and harvesting go together,
sometimes in the smallest moments.
There are about 2,000 devotional
posts and 400 sermons in the Rocky Road Devotions
library. To dig deeper on
today’s topic, explore some of these: Leaving the Door UNLOCKED for
God's Spirit and
Wisdom & Discipline
[1] Images: Pixabay.com Unless noted, Scripture quoted from The New Living Translation©
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