What Does God Say About Disciplining Children

Introduction

Well, I’m glad to be with you again tonight and to study this subject of the disciplining of children. I want you to begin with me by looking first of all at Judges chapter 13. Judges chapter 13, and I want to look at verse 8. Judges 13 verse 8. This man, Manoah and his wife have been promised a child. You and I know that child is Samson, who is going to deliver the Israelites from the Philistines. But as they’re preparing to have this child, verse 8 says, Manoah entreated the Lord and said, Oh Lord, please let the man of God whom you have sent come to us again, that he may teach us what to do for the boy who is to be born. Now the man he’s talking about is an angel of the Lord that had appeared to Manoah and his wife to tell them they were going to have this child of promise, this deliverer, this great, powerful judge of Israel.

And when they say, send this man of God back that he can teach us what we need to do with our children, he’s really asking God, send an angel to help me. I don’t know about you, but there have been times in my life as a parent when I’ve asked for God’s help and wished he’d send an angel. Not because angels necessarily I need to demonstrate their power, but angels I need to tell me what God’s will is for me as a parent with his children. The specifics of dealing with my children. And the ultimate purpose of all of that, as Manoah says here, that he may teach us what to do for the boy who is to be born. The ultimate desire and purpose of that teaching us what to do, I find very well articulated in Genesis chapter 18.

In Genesis 18, God is talking to Abraham. And he says about him in verse 19, I have chosen him so 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 upon Abraham what he has spoken about him.

First is this idea, God says about Abraham, I’ve chosen him to raise up his children. I have picked him to raise children. Every parent could stand in the place of Abraham like that. Every parent has been chosen to be the parents of children that God wants you to raise. They’re not yours. We’re just stewards. They’re not mine. We’re stewards of what God has given us. These small fragile children. But the second thing about that is this statement that he may command his children to keep the way of the Lord. How? By doing righteousness and justice. Not by teaching them righteousness and justice, but by doing it ourselves. When we do what God tells us to do, we’ve got half of this problem licked in rearing our children before the Lord.

It’s a difficult subject to speak on this discipline for a couple of reasons. First of all, our culture isn’t real keen on discipline these days.

And when he started to do it again, she said, I felt like I had to spank him. And I, my immediate reaction was, oh, I hope he didn’t do that in public. Man, I got worn out in public. It would not have been uncommon for me or for my wife and the families we were in for our dads to snake off a belt right there in public and chase us around whooping us against the legs. But in our culture, that’s a dangerous thing to do. Now, I’m not here to tell you tonight, so don’t ever touch your children. That’s not my point, and I want you to stay with me as I try to develop this point. But I am telling you, it’s a different culture than I grew up in.

And so we do have to at least be aware of some of the things that we may have done freely and openly that we may not be able to do as freely and openly as we did before. Because we do live in a culture in which that kind of discipline can get us into trouble. Even if the Lord tells us to do those things, there may be better opportunities and times for us to discipline our children in any kind of corporal way than the way I was raised. My mother, and some of you probably did the same. My mother made me go pick out the switch with which I was to be beaten. Go out in the backyard and bring me back a switch. Only one time did I try bringing back a little twig, you know.

Here, wear me out. Go at it. No, it was drag in a log here. Beat me. But it’s a different culture. Does that change what God says? No, not at all.

I know, and the second reason that I speak about this with some trepidation is because I do believe that some people abuse children. I know that happens. Some people abuse our children physically, some people abuse our children mentally. We’ll talk about some of those things in the course of this lesson. But I want to tell you, the abuses of God’s law do not negate the laws themselves. Misapplication of what God has to say doesn’t change the fact that God still said some things about this subject. In fact, he said a lot about this subject. It seems to me that the goal of all of our discipline, and I want to say, discipline, I said this on Sunday. Discipline is more than punishment. Punishment is a part of discipline, but discipline is more than that.

Take a soldier who goes off to basic training or boot camp, depending on what service he’s joined. There is discipline taking place from the very first day of that training. They’re disciplining him to get up at a certain hour, to go to bed at a certain hour, to eat in a certain way. That’s not meant to be punishment. He may see it as punishment, he may feel like it is, but that’s not punishment. He’s not getting that because he’s done something wrong. He’s getting that so that he will do what is right. And so much of discipline is that, folks. Telling our children to go to bed at a certain time isn’t necessarily why? What did I do wrong? You may not have done anything wrong.

1. Jesus Grew in Wisdom, Stature, and Favor

It’s part of the training that we do so that our children will grow up to be healthy and wise and love the Lord their God and to love their neighbors as they love themselves. So when we talk about discipline, we’re not just talking about how, when, and where I spank my children or punish my children. There’s much more to discipline than that. It’s the whole process of training. And Luke chapter 2. And when we read about Jesus being raised, I got to tell you, I don’t know how you and I would cope being parents of Jesus.

You know, did he? Did he have to be trained? I mean, he’s the son of God. And the answer is yes. Yes, he had to be trained also. This statement in verse 52 that tells us Jesus kept increasing in wisdom and stature in favor with God and with men. That he was growing. And in verse 40, even back earlier, the child continued to grow and become strong, increasing in wisdom, and the grace of God was upon him. That didn’t come just by osmosis for him. His parents were training him. It’s very clear that his parents had hands-on involvement in his life. But I want you to note for just a minute those four things Jesus grew in. Because I’ll tell you, as parents, we need to put those up mentally before us all the time and make sure these are the four areas in which our children are growing.

And first of those, it says, and he was increasing in wisdom. We need to make certain that our children are growing in wisdom. And it’s not just what they learn in the school system. There’s got to be a balance in teaching our children these things. Too much or too little emphasis on any one of these four areas can cause an imbalance in the lives of our children. Some parents key so much on their children becoming intellectually superior. That they create children who are arrogant, who are elitist in their thinking. We can spend so much money and time and effort in our children growing in knowledge, mistaking that for wisdom, that we create children who think not that there is a God only, but that there is.

It’s important that our children increase, not just in knowledge, not just education, but in wisdom. Practical life lessons. And let me tell you where that comes. That doesn’t come from a classroom. I don’t know any college that’s effectively teaching a course called Practical Wisdom 101. But where you do get that is in discussing the experiences of life and what you can learn from those experiences.

Because lessons come from failure. I did this this way, and it didn’t work out. I’ve learned a way not to do that again. And talking about failures that our children suffer. Your child runs for office in school. They’re running for class favorite, or they’re running for student government president or secretary or treasurer, or they’re running for sophomore class president, and they lose. What do you do with that? What do you do with that? Do you say to your child, let’s not talk about that. I know that’s painful. We’re not going to talk about that. We’re just going to ignore that. Tell our spouses, don’t talk about that. Don’t ask them how the election went today. It didn’t go well. Or don’t ask him how the game went.

He played or she played, but she didn’t do very well. And don’t talk about that. Or do we cover up for it? Well, what do those kids know? They’re stupid. You’re the only intelligent one. That’s why you only got one vote.

Or of course you couldn’t win. Nobody on the team was supporting you. If they had been helping you like they should have and could have, if the coach had given the right place, if this had happened, if that had happened, if it hadn’t been raining, if it had been raining, whatever it is, make excuses for it, but we don’t want our children to know they failed in any way. You’re making a mistake, parents. You’re making a mistake. Because everybody fails. Something. And it’s important to learn the lessons of failure. And how to cope with it. And that’s where wisdom comes. I love the businessman who was asked by a young businessman, up and coming. He had a reputation for being the wisest man in his industry.

He said, How did you learn so much? He said, I learned from making good decisions. He said, But how did you learn to make good decisions? He said, I made a lot of bad decisions. You make the bad ones, and then you learn what the good ones are, and then you become successful. Now you try to short circuit that and go from bad decisions to success without learning the lessons of the bad decisions, you make a mistake. I’m telling you. Growing in wisdom is important. And growing in stature is important. The growth of the physical body is important. We need to make sure our children are growing physically and that they’re healthy in what they do. You know, I’m not saying my parents did everything right.

But I don’t know how many children today have experienced what many of us experienced when we were younger. There were times when my mother would come in and I’d be laying down, watching TV or reading or doing nothing, and she’d say, get up and go outside and play. It did not enter my mind at all to go outside and play at that point. She’d say, go outside. You’re not allowed to come back in until you’re sweating. There was something about that. And for so many young people today, the absolute strongest part of their bodies are these.

Over, over, over, punching, punching, punching. But you know, you don’t get a lot of jobs with these.

And these can be healthy and you can die. Growing in stature is important for our children. Too much emphasis on that, though? Let me tell you. You can over-emphasize that, and it leads to narcissism. Love of the body. Or hedonism. Or bullying. Growing in favor with men is important. It’s important to teach our children how to get along with others. How to win friends and influence people. Because I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you something. You may have never read that book by Dale Carnegie, and that’s fine. But I’m going to tell you something. If you cannot make friends and influence people, you can’t teach anybody the gospel of Jesus Christ. You hear me? If you can’t make friends and influence people, you can’t teach anybody the gospel.

So it’s not just learn how to do this so you can manipulate people all your life and get them to do what you want them to do. It’s important to teach our children how to get along with others. How to play fair and how to give consideration to others and let other people go first. That’s important. It’s all part of discipline. Jesus grew in favor with men. But you can overemphasize that. And develop a child who is the constant victim of peer pressure. Only looking to curry the favor of the world. And fourth, he grew in favor with God. Too little of that emphasis, and you’ll raise children who won’t serve the Lord. And I find it interesting that that comes forth in this list. You’d think with Jesus, that’d be number one, but it’s listed forth.

He was growing in wisdom, he was growing in stature, he grew in favor with men and in favor with God. And I want to tell you, if you if you’ve got those, that first one, that last one down first, and you’re really concerned about what God wants, those other three will happen because God’s concerned about those things. Wisdom, stature, and favor with men.

2. Every Parent Is to Discipline

I’m in Hebrews chapter 12 for just a few minutes. I invite you to join me there. Hebrews chapter 12. This is, in my opinion, the longest consistent and concise discourse on the subject of discipline I know of anywhere in the Bible. Proverbs is full of statements about discipline. But this is the most concise discussion of discipline I find anywhere in the Bible. And what it’s meant to do is show God disciplines you like your parents discipline you. And so it’s good for us. So what he says about God’s discipline is also what should be true of us as parents. As we try to discipline, control, bring up, train up our children. These are the things that should be true. Now I want to begin in chapter 12.

I want to look at verse 7. Actually, let’s go back to verse 4. You’ve not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood and you’re striving against sin. You’ve forgotten the exhortation addressed to you as sons. My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor faint when you are reproved by him. For those whom the Lord loves, he disciplines. And he scourges every son whom he receives. It is for discipline that you endure. God deals with you as with sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? Let’s stop there. We’re going to read more. Let’s stop there and make our first real point. Every parent is to discipline. This is not something any parent can say, well, that’s just not my thing.

There is an assumption in this passage that parents discipline children. Do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor faint when you are reproved by him. He scourges every son whom he receives. Every child is to be disciplined. And that’s not just one parent. Every parent is to be involved in discipline. Some families have relegated that to one parent. In some families, it’s a father. He becomes the rod of discipline. Mom is always the nice one, dad’s the tough one. And the line then comes, wait till your father gets home. You say that often enough, the kids will be praying. Don’t let dad come home. Think about that. Now I know there were times when my wife said that to my children, but she also disciplined them.

It wasn’t just nothing’s going to happen until the big bad guy comes in. When the warden walks in, then everybody shapes up. It wasn’t that kind of thing in our household, and it’s not supposed to be that way in yours. Everybody has to take their part. You’re going to give birth to them, you’re going to have to discipline them. If you’re going to adopt them as your own. Even as we have been adopted into the family of God, we’re all adopted children in the family of God. He disciplines us. It is the responsibility of parents to do that. I like this. Somebody said it is the child’s responsibility to rebel. It is the parents’ responsibility to contain that rebellion within safe, appropriate limits. I want you to think about that for a minute.

I think there’s a lot of wisdom in that. And that rebellion isn’t necessarily because kids are all bad. That’s not my point, and I don’t think that’s the point of the writer. But it is this. Children, as they grow, are feeling their own sense of independence. Even from a young age, they’re learning what it means to be independent. And we want them that way. Amanda’s feeding Walker now, and I go back to him because he’s young and he’s a little. He’s in our house, and she’s giving him a spoon, and it is the ugliest sight you ever saw. I mean, the food goes everywhere. He tries. He sticks that spoon down in the oatmeal and then he brings it somewhere near his face, and after running it around, he finds the mouth and it goes in, and he eats a little bit of that.

But he’s got it everywhere. But that’s important. He’s learning independence. You don’t want to feed your child when they’re 18 years old. But when they start feeding themselves, it’s likely they’re going to start eating things you don’t want them to eat. Whether it’s snack foods that you don’t want them eating, or other kinds of things they pick up off the floor you don’t want them eating, or live toads that run in the yard, you don’t want them eating. But that’s part of their independence. That looks good to me. I think I’ll taste it. That’s part of the growth process. And your responsibility as a parent is to contain that rebellion within safe, appropriate limits. So, yeah, they’re going to run toward the street, and you’re going to contain that.

And when they’re 16 and they’re driving, they’re going to stay out late, and you’re going to contain that. And they’re going to go places or want to go places with their friends that you are going to contain them from. It’s their job to push the limits and find out where I am and where I can go. And it’s your job to say you don’t go beyond this point. Isn’t that fairly clear? I’m not even asking if you agree with it. You may not agree with it. You can shake your heads yes. It’s clear. If it’s not clear, I’m starting all over.

3. Discipline as a Badge of Family Ownership

You may not agree with it. By shaking your head, yes, it’s clear. You’re not saying I agree completely with everything you said. So I’m not going to put you on the line for that. But that seems really clear to me that that’s the job of the child and the job of the parent. To contain their rebellion within safe, appropriate limits. Every parent has to be involved in that. That’s not a mother thing or a father thing. That’s a parent thing. Now look at verse 8 with me. But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. I’ve got to tell you, in our culture, in our culture, being an illegitimate child doesn’t carry the stigma that it has carried in some situations.

But here’s a point he’s making. If you’re not willing to subject yourself to the discipline of God, then you don’t have any right to be in the family. And I think the point of that is every child needs discipline as a badge of family ownership. I’m telling you, children need discipline for many reasons, but they want discipline because it shows we care.

But it shows we care. And that we have some kind of interest in what they’re doing with their lives. And that’s the point that the Hebrew writer is making. If you don’t want to be disciplined, why are you even in the family? And if you are in the family, then you will subject yourself to the disciplines of this family. We sometimes see discipline as a cruel thing. And if we discipline our children, if we discipline them properly, if we punish them properly, we’re going to drive them away. So we don’t want to do that. We just want to love them. We just want to love them and we want to affirm them, and we want to make sure they understand their self-worth. We have raised children with a whole generation of self-worthiness.

And I’m going to tell you something. They’re no better disciplined than any other generation that ever existed. And in many cases, they’re sitting in psychiatric offices on couches trying to find out who and where they are. Listen to the words of the Proverbs, chapter 13, verse 24. He who withholds his rod hates his son. Did you hear that? Withhold the rod. God says you hate your child. See, we think the exact opposite. Oh, don’t punish them, love them. Don’t punish them, love them. The rod of reproof, rod of discipline. We sometimes think that’s punishment that will reflect our anger and bitterness and disappointment and hatred of our children. Not so. It demonstrates love. I think about the story about this professor who had been taught in the schools of our universities, who was constantly telling people in the neighborhood, don’t discipline your children.

Just love them. Just love them. You’ve got to just love them. And the people got so tired of hearing that. They couldn’t do anything to their kids without the professor saying, just love them. You’ve got to love them. Well, one day the professor was out there and he was pouring new concrete for a sidewalk. And here come one of the little boys in the neighborhood, and he saw that, and he couldn’t resist it. He pedaled his bike faster and went right through the middle of that concrete. Left a deep track in it. A professor was chasing him down the street. And one of the people in the neighborhood said, Hey, professor, just love him. He said, I love them in the abstract, but not in the concrete.

See, I think sometimes we love in the abstract, but not in the concrete. Let me tell you what concrete love is. Concrete love is discipline. He who loves him disciplines him diligently. I didn’t say that. I didn’t create that. That’s what God said. If you love your children, you discipline them diligently. And you know what that creates? Verse 9. Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us and we respected them. Shall we not much rather be subject to the father of spirits and live? We respected them because they disciplined us. There is a respect we have for those who discipline us. We respect the police officer. You better.

You have nothing. In the same way, parents who are diligent about disciplining their children. I’m not talking about playing word games with them. I’m not talking about making threats. Man, I hear some parents. They make incredible threats. Those threats are graphic threats. So you dip back over here. I’m going to rip your head off. I’ve never seen that happen. I don’t want to see that happen. But we make those kinds of threats. Do the children respect that? Have they ever seen it done? I’ll put you on restriction till you die. I’ll hit you so hard when you quit rolling, your clothes will be out of date.

We say those kinds of things. We say those things, and those are empty words, folks. Those are empty words. That’s just threats. That’s not discipline. Discipline is training. It’s saying when you do this, this is the result. And it’s not ands, buts, and ifs about it. It’s not sometimes that’ll happen and other times it won’t. But when you are consistent like that, they will respect you. Remember what was said about Abraham. That he would teach them by his righteousness and justice.

4. God Always Disciplines for the Child’s Good

Verse 10. For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, so that we may share his holiness. I think here we’ve got a contrast between parents who try but fail and the ultimate expression of discipline in God. We’re striving for that ladder. We’re striving for that discipline of God. And I’ll tell you, as a parent, every parent here can say, I’ve failed at that. There have been times when we told our children to do things not because it was good for them, but because we just needed it. So we told them, it’s time for you to go to bed. It’s only seven o’clock. I’m tired of you. Go to bed.

We have a new rule tonight, 7 o’clock curfew tonight. It’s a new rule. Did we get to vote on that? Nope. I have a headache. It’s a new rule. Those are, that’s discipline for our sake. Or we put up with something night after night after night, and it doesn’t bother us, but then one night we’re having a bad evening. Something’s gone wrong with us. Maybe we’ve had a bad day at work. The dog bit us when we came in, or the garbage was all over the yard because animals got in it. We had to clean it up. Now we come in, they do the same thing they’ve done the last four nights, and now all of a sudden we can’t stand it. We discipline, but sometimes it’s for our own good.

But God always disciplines for the child’s good. Let me tell you to remember that, folks. Let me tell you to remember all discipline should be for the benefit of the child. And what that means is a number of things. But what I mean by that is don’t ever discipline just out of anger or revenge. Discipline because it’s good for the child. Not because it just made you mad. Not because it just inconvenienced you. But because it’s good for the child. Always think in those terms. Is this going to be beneficial for my child? And may I say, I’ve been talking about children, but can I say also that’s true for grandparents too? I know a number of you are grandparents in the audience. But, you know, sometimes as we become grandparents, we get crotchety.

You know. And what we put up with as parents in our children, suddenly we don’t want it in our grandchildren. Turn the music down. It was fine when our kids played it. It was fine when we played it. And it was okay when our children played it, but now when our grandchildren play it, we want quiet. Or we don’t want them doing this or that that we let our children do. And we know our children were okay doing it, but now all of a sudden we just have shorter fuses and we take it out on the grandkids. Don’t do that. Don’t do that. Be consistent as a grandparent. You’re also training. Well, look at one more thing with you. Verse 11. All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful.

Now I want you to listen to that again. All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful. But to those who have been trained by it, afterwards, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness. All discipline for the moment seems sorrowful. Now I’m not saying by that, make your children miserable. But know this that much of what we do to train our children will not be pleasant for them at the moment. It won’t be. Getting them up in the morning. Look, you can try. You can try all you want, I think, about making getting up time so pleasant. You can buy those great alarms where the light gradually gets brighter and aromatherapy takes over, and they smell these things in the room. And the alarm itself starts out, you know, real soft.

Wake up. Wake up. Wake up! I mean, you can do that if you want. But what I’m telling you is, I don’t care how you wake your kids up, they don’t like getting up. I mean, that’s just that’s just the fact of life. Most of us don’t like getting up. The bed’s warm, and we’d like to stay there, and it feels good laying there, and we don’t want to get up. It’s a disciplinary thing. For the moment, it seems sorrowful. But I’ll tell you what, teach that lesson to your children early. Teach it to them firmly, and they will thank you one day for that. They won’t be late for work, and they won’t have a mate who says, if I had only known they can’t get out of bed in the morning, and devise all kinds of horrible ways to get them up and out, and end up having to do with you or your children what perhaps you should have done much earlier.

Discipline does not seem pleasant at the time. So I’m not saying by that, so it is not my point to say, so don’t care at all about your kids’ feelings. Just do whatever you’re going to do. But know this that that’s a natural reaction to discipline. It’s normal. It’s what every kid is supposed to do. Whine and complain and threaten to call some government official on you. That’s just the way it feels for them. But know that that’s going to be the case. Look, I didn’t say that. That’s in the book, isn’t it? That’s exactly what the book says. All discipline for the moment seems sorrowful. But afterwards it yields. And I love the way it says this. Afterwards, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.

5. Number One, Consistency

It’ll bring peace in their lives. Discipline your children young, and it’ll bring peace in their lives. They’ll get along better in school. They’ll get along with teachers better. They’ll get along better with their neighborhood friends. They’ll get along much better with the neighborhood adults. When the adults say to them, hey, hey, hey, don’t be playing over there. Say, who are you to talk to me? That won’t happen. And they’ll get along better with police officers. Should they ever encounter one of those in an unfavorable circumstance? It’s just going to make their lives better. Let me close very quickly with two practical considerations for you. No passages on this, just some practical considerations for you. Number one, consistency. You got to be consistent in your discipline. You have to be consistent with your own actions and your own life.

You have to tell them to do as I do. Not do as I say. Kids know. They know when you’re being inconsistent. And they know hypocrisy when they see it. They can learn that at a very young age. Little boy was asked the question, how old are you? And he said, Well, that depends. And he said, What does that depend on? How old are you? He said, Well, it depends on whether we’re at the movie or not. Are you twelve? Not really. At least that’s what my dad says. Be consistent. With your own principles. With your own rules. Always enforce those rules the same way. As much as it lies within you, be consistent about that. If you don’t want this to happen, make sure that doesn’t happen all the time.

Not just when you’re in a bad mood or things aren’t going your way, or you just decided to bear down on them. Be consistent with your rules. Is it wrong for them to run in certain circumstances? Then don’t let them run in those circumstances. Period. Period. Not you can run until somebody else catches you, and then I’ll have to correct you. Be consistent with the different children. You know, sometimes we have children that are different. Boy, we had three girls. I don’t know how all three of those girls came from the same womb. I don’t know how they were genetically connected in some ways. They were so different. Our oldest daughter, when you disciplined her, she would bow up. She’d argue. She wanted to argue. I love that.

I loved the arguments. I mean, I love being able to prove her wrong. So that’s good. That’s good. Let’s sit down. Let’s call a judge in here. I’ll be the prosecutor. You’ll be the defense. We’ll settle this one. I I realize that. My second daughter was the exact opposite. My second daughter, you told her she did something wrong, she immediately hung her head and apologized. Immediately. And it didn’t matter what you said, because I wanted the fight. How could you do something like that? I don’t know. I’m sorry. Well, I know, but you did. I know. I don’t know how I did that. I’m sorry. It drove me crazy. I wanted her to fight. I wanted some satisfaction in this. I didn’t want her giving in.

Different children, different ways. But what I’m saying about that is you better be consistent in your enforcement of the rules. You got one child balls when you correct them. You got another one that bows up. You want to go after the one that bows up and be lenient on the one that balls. Don’t do that. Be consistent. They know the difference. And then be consistent in the unity of the parents. Look, my wife and I didn’t agree on everything that we should do with our children. But the children never knew that. When it came time to talk to the kids, we were a monolith. One step quiet when we didn’t agree with it, but we let them believe we were one flesh in this matter, and they were not going to divide us.

6. Respect Your Children

You better be consistent about that because they will divide and conquer. They will go to the parent that they think is consistent with them. And I’ll tell you what else that says. The most important relationship. I told you this once, the most important relationship in your family is not the parent-child relationship, it’s a husband-wife relationship. You get that one right and show that consistency, and your children will fall into place. Final point, practical point, respect your children. Let me say this to you. Seriously. Our time is up, but listen to this, please. Don’t humiliate your children when you discipline them. One of the most painful scenes in my childhood memory was seeing a young boy who lived across the street from me, who got upset with his father about something when his dad corrected him and started crying, and his father said, Stop that crying, you’re acting like a baby.

That boy didn’t quit crying. He was beyond that point and kept crying. And that father took that boy. And he took his clothes off of him and put him in a diaper and shoved him out of the house. Where all of us in the neighborhood saw this boy clutching the back door handle, crying to get back inside, and his father had left him out there. I’m telling you, folks, you have no idea as an adult how scarring that kind of humiliation is. Can’t you take that child that needs disciplining and pull him off to the side? I see some parents do that so well. Their children are misbehaving and they just say, Come here, come here. I know what’s happening. I turn away. But they bring them over to the side.

They take them over into the corner and they stand there and they talk to him right over here, and they talk to him. And everybody else is doing their thing, and they’re talking to him. And that child’s hurt. That child may cry, but that child is not humiliated.

An article I read called What Your Child Fears Most. And they ask a bunch of adults, which one of these two do you think your child would rather have? And almost without exception, the parents got the wrong answers. Here were some of them. In surveying the parents, they guessed wrong as to what children dread most. In the choice between do you dread the birth of a new baby in your family? Which is pretty traumatic. We think, oh, that child who’s been the center of attention’s about to find out there are other people in the world. And we think that’s bad. But the kids, when they answered that question, said, no, that’s not nearly as bad as losing our peers’ respect. Losing the respect of our friends is much more traumatic than bringing a new baby in.

The adults missed that. You know what else they missed? Which is worse? A trip to the dentist’s office or a trip to the principal’s office? We’re adults, we know, don’t we? Oh, trip to the dentist’s office. Drilling, filling, sticking. We don’t like that. The kids, without exception. No, I’d much rather go to the dentist than the principal’s office. Why? Because it’s a respect thing. It’s a humiliation thing. And this one will really get you. Which is worse for a child? Surgery or wetting your pants in class. And every child said, I’d rather go under the knife. Even kids who had had consolectomies. That wasn’t as painful as one incident of incontinence in a classroom. And then they said, children said, flunking is as bad as going blind.

You and I would say, they don’t know. Okay, they don’t. But that’s what they feel. And when you and I grab those kids and we jerk them up in front of other people, or we wear them out in front of somebody, or we ask them that question that has no answer. What are you stupid? It’s crushing to them. Respect your children, even as you discipline them. Respect them. It is not improper for you to spank them and then hug them and remind them you love them. And in the home, make your home a place of welcome for other kids. Can I tell you this? My parents did one thing better than almost any of the parents of any of the kids I knew. They said to me, if you ever want to have kids over to the house, ever, you just tell us and you can bring them to the house.

Now I thought they were just being generous to me, but you know what they were doing? And I know that as a parent because I did the same thing.

If they’re at my house, if my daughters have brought the friends to my house, I’m in control. I know what they’re listening to and what they’re doing and what they’re watching and who’s there and how they’re acting. If I let them go off to somebody else’s house, I have no idea. Make your house a house of welcome. It’s a ministry. My best friend obeyed the gospel. Because he was always welcome at our house. When his own father, who was an alcoholic, would drive him out, he slept at our house. And he says to this day, it was seeing the godly parents that my best friend had and feeling the love of that family that made me realize there was something better in my life. And it was Jesus Christ.

Conclusion

He’s preaching the gospel today. Because my parents created an atmosphere of respect and warmth that enabled other children to be there. Boys will be boys, but one day they’ll be men. And girls will be girls, but one day they will be women. And we better make sure we’re doing what we can to create the atmosphere in our homes that will guide them to Jesus Christ. Thanks for listening. We’re going to sing this song that John has picked. And if there’s anything at all that we can do to help you tonight, maybe your suffering is a parent and you’re not doing the things you ought to do. You want to be more like our God and Father in heaven? I’m sure we can find the resources tonight to help you get on the path of being the kind of parent you ought to be.

Are you a rebellious child and you’re realizing tonight the things your parents have done have really been in your best interest and you need forgiveness for that? It would be a good time for us to make those things known and clean and get them out in the open and behind us and start walking with the Lord again. If we can help you in any way like that tonight, why don’t you come to the front and share it with us while we stand and sing.