Spankings, for the win!

I’m so thankful my parents spanked me. Yes. I am.

If they hadn’t I would still be living selfishly, angrily, sometimes even hostilely. I wouldn’t understand so well that there are bad consequences for doing bad things and good consequences for doing good things. I probably wouldn’t have very many friends either.

Honestly people, you CANNOT reason with a 3 year old, often times not even a 4 or 5 year old. However, a little tap on the behind is reason enough for a little tyke not to try the same naughty thing again.

I promise you, the child will not surely die! “Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you punish him with the rod, he will not die. Punish him with the rod and save his soul from death.” (Pr. 23:13-14) I am a prime example of this =) I can’t even come close to knowing how many thousands of spankings I must have received, growing up. I was a foolish, rebellious child. I needed a good spanking. My parent’s gave it to me. It worked.

The trick to effective spankings is not how hard you give them, what you use, where, when or how you give them.

It’s about what you give with them.

Proverbs 13:24 says, “whoever spares the rod hates their children; but the one who loves their children is careful to discipline them”.

LOVE. that’s the key to proper discipline. 

My parents always had a disciplinary-package-deal for us: spanking with a side of prayer and a full course of (loving) instruction. Now I’m not saying theirs is the perfect way to discipline a child. Every family is different and I know I sure didn’t appreciate the correction when I was that age. But they persevered and it paid off. They disciplined and instructed, even if I was rolling my eyes, pretending to sleep, yelling back, whatever. In doing so, they helped release some of the foolishness that is bound up in the heart of me, their child. (Pr. 22:15 ) ‘Cause let me tell you, If you don’t unbind the foolishness while a child is young, it doesn’t just go away when they turn into an “adult”. No, it stays with them. Lots of terrible foolishness.

However, a child disciplined in love will lose some of the foolishness and keep the instruction with them. Discipline helps us grow, and even though we continue to make mistakes, we know why it was wrong, we understand that we are grieving God and we eventually desire to change our ways. Change so that others (and ourselves) will be blessed. 

In our culture today, so many children are rude and disrespectful. Hateful, mean, inappropriate. But what’s stopping them? So what, if they have to listen to their teacher speak for 45 seconds. The foolishness is still worth it. But is it worth a couple of spankings? Some kids will never know. Some kids do know, but they know something more along the lines of abuse, not discipline, which leads to anger and rebellion, not change of heart.

I wish our culture would understand this. I really do. Because sin only ever gets worse on its own. Undisciplined children almost always grow up to be foolish adults. And they are foolish and sometimes dangerous on the way to adulthood and even in adulthood. They haven’t learned (or been taught) things like self-control, thinking of others more importantly than themselves, or things as simple as sharing. They grow up pleasing themselves, no matter what. 

God instructs us to discipline children to do the right things.

Proverbs 22:6 says, “train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.”

And with that, I’d like to encourage you. 

If you are a child, please choose to accept the loving discipline from your parents or other caregivers, so that with God’s help you will grow to be the best person you possibly can be. And be thankful! it really is to help you.

If you are a parent (or are going to be), prayerfully consider how you should lovingly discipline your children so that they will learn to heed God’s ways and walk in His path.

If you are the person who has decided to turn me in to child services, or is appalled that I would write something like this, please re-read the top paragraphs. I’m writing from experience, and I'm writing what I see: that the children of today need a good dose of what I got - Discipline.

Besides, if God has so much to say on the subject, it must be important! Don’t believe me? Go check out the Bible!

Oh, and thank you, Mommy and Daddy =)