31 Day Daily ChampionSample

Proverbs 23:13

“Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you punish them with the rod, they will not die.”

PRINCIPLE:

It requires discipline to discipline correctly.

The purpose of discipline is to teach children that doing wrong will cause pain in their lives. There is a raging debate on whether children should be disciplined. Raising children in a disciplined environment would seem to be common sense, but there is a lot of argument against corporal punishment.

My wife and I raised three children. Interestingly, we had to use physical punishment on only a few occasions. Our children knew I would not hesitate to correct them, so they consistently obeyed our directives and respected our leadership.

My goal in discipline was to demonstrate obedience. They could live under my rewards or lose them by disobedience. It was their choice. I would continue to meet their basic needs: food, shelter, and water, but they would not have the privileges and my gracious rewards. It was pretty simple yet proved to be an effective process.

One more thought about children. I learned early on that most of the time, the strong personality traits that could cause them to misbehave were positive traits undisciplined. For example, stubbornness was often a conviction misdirected. Rebellion could be creative thinking without guidance. Do you see the point?

This process helped my children understand God’s reward system: grace and truth. Grace is there at times, but there are also times for truth. Too many laws and children will never live up to your rules and demands. Too much grace, and they will run wild without restraint.

REMEMBER:

Punishment is temporary pain to avoid permanent judgment.