Spare the Rod, Part 2 (of 2)

 

Borrowing again from Solomon we read, “Even a child is known by his deeds, whether what he does is pure and right… The rod and rebuke give wisdom, but a child left to himself brings shame to his mother,” Proverbs 20:11, 29:15. The latter portion of this passage is interesting. The child left to himself brings shame. Why? Because it was accepted universally and until rather recently on history’s stage that parents were to govern their children. We are to teach, correct, rebuke. Failure to do so reflected not so much on the child, but the parent. Clearly the reservoir of knowledge stored up in the mother was not given to her child. He is simply, “left to himself.”  We live in an era where we are standing witness to children given peculiar rights. They are granted access to questionable or controversial things such as identifying gender pronouns or gender reassignment, though our government does not recognize a child as having the right to vote, marry, smoke, drink, drive, or hold a job. In this curious and dangerous era our role as parents must be reemphasized and reinforced. If we abdicate this role, rest assured someone else will be more than eager to fill it. For those of us who claim to be Christian, but side with this unusual subjective liberality, God calls out to us, “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil…woe to those who are wise in their own eyes,” Isaiah 5:20, 21.

To accentuate this warning one should examine the book of Judges. An exercise in grief and journey into spiraling moral disintegration, Israel’s history was bleak indeed at this point. We find the author relating the awful choices being made on the authority of subjective morality based on human preference rather than immutable law, founded on God’s character and authority. “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes,” Judges 21:25; 17:6; 18:1; 19:1. The verse occurs twice verbatim, and twice truncated as a reminder of the absence of central government. Judges was a chaotic period of history for Israel, and I believe the reason was neatly summarized by the verse cited. God did not ordain the choices made, but He did permit them as an object lesson for Israel, and for us. The Jews had quite a library of experiences, and it is to our folly if we neglect to learn from them.

 

After all, what are wisdom and experience for, if not to impart to others, especially those whom we claim to love? What are convictions for if they are only to be held as personal secrets, good for no one but the bearer? No, a conviction is the state of being convinced. A convinced person acts on their convictions publicly or privately. Fellow saints, do we believe God’s word is true? Then it is also true for our children, our neighbors, and people half a world away. If you are not Christian, your conscience must speak to you about the necessity of training your child under the banner of a moral law. Granted, that term may cause distaste for the irreligious. Moral laws posit a lawgiver, simply because laws of such a nature are not for things, but for people. Laws of a personal nature, concerning right and wrong must be administered by a personal being so that we may relate to and understand them. The appeal is made not based on what MUST happen, like physical laws such as gravity. It is based rather on what SHOULD happen. But just because we can violate the moral low through our volition does not negate its existence. Rather the attendant guilt and consequences of breaking said law elegantly demonstrate its reality in every human heart.

 

The Bible goes on to take us down a path that the modern reader might shudder at, since we live in an era when self-esteem, self-love and other selfisms have been enshrined like the idols of old in our collective thinking. Nonetheless, Solomon tells us in no uncertain terms how to help mold a child to become a functioning, contributing adult.

 

Do not withhold correction from a child, for if you beat him with a rod, he will not die. You shall beat him with a rod and deliver his soul from hell, Proverbs 23:13-14.

 

He who spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him disciplines him promptly, Proverbs 13:24.

 

Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child; the rod of correction will drive it far from him, Proverbs 22:15.

 

Until a child begins to gain individual discernment by learning, the corrective rod is suggested. To help a child associate sin with danger or wrongdoing, Solomon commends physical correction. We spank a child when they are smaller and reason isn’t really going to benefit. Little ones don’t grasp reason the way older children will. And when an older child sins, leading to correction, use it to create opportunity to teach and help them grow and strengthen their own sense of discernment. Note Proverbs 13:24. The parent that spares their child discipline demonstrates hatred for them. Loosing the reins, or releasing them completely for the sake of permitting a child to experiment independently is tantamount to expressing hatred for your child. The part we parents play in the development of our children cannot be overstated. We are the library from which they borrow many volumes until the time they have amassed enough literature of their own to clearly navigate the pitfalls of life. Yet even as adults, no good parent would shun sharing our wisdom to help teach our children after they are grown. Boundaries are required if safety is to be achieved. Teaching is required if knowledge is to be gained. Freedom requires rules; freedom sans any rules isn’t freedom: it is anarchy. Like a sports game, the rules exist to provide the ability to engage and enjoy that sport. Without rules, the game would devolve into directionless chaos.

 

Do not surrender your children to a competing worldview that robs you of parental authority. On whose authority is this claim even made? If it is subjective opinion and nothing more, have it to yourself and trouble no one else with it. Because the authority of opinion, popular or otherwise, extends no further than yourself. If this view’s claimants suggest they possess objective authority, the burden of proof is on them to compel us, through sound reasoning and evidence, to remove the foundation of the moral order created by God and settle it on the shifting sands of subjectivity. If morality really is a social construct, artificial in its origin, then in the end all is merely opinion. This belief engenders worse problems than it can ever hope to solve because it makes our individual belief system as valuable (or pointless) as a serial killer or rapist.

 

If all beliefs are held in the balance of equity for the sake of pandering to the individual’s sense of entitlement when it comes to self-determination, we have effectively silenced ourselves when it comes to matters of conviction. But praise be to Jesus Christ our Lord that in His infinite mercy He has shown all of us, “a more excellent way,” 1 Corinthians 12:31. Our children are our legacy; they are living evidence of what we believe and how we lived. Let us bravely teach and inform our children that life is purposeful. Morality is not the concoction of humanity, prone to change as society does. God has in fact revealed Himself and entered human history through Jesus Christ and the Bible contains many infallible proofs of this truth. So armed, guide your children like the proverbial arrow: straight to the target with intention and deliberation. “But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever,” 1 Timothy 5:8.