Discipling for Success instead of Failure

“Don’t cry over spilt milk!”

There are three levels of discipline

Ignorance: The lack of experience or knowledge of a subject or activity.

We all learn from inferred knowledge. We build new knowledge on the experiences of the past.

“You can't know what you don't know. You can't know about things you have yet to discover.” - Johnathan Raymond

Kids lack the experience to know what to do in every situation until they have experienced it.

Ignorance gives an opportunity for learning through experience.

Discipline should be in the form instruction.

Foolishness: acting with a lack of understanding of fear or consequences

Kids are oblivious to danders and consequences of their actions.

Foolishness gives opportunity to reset the path.Discipline should be in the form of warning.

Rebellion: The willful defiance against authority and structure.

Kids will push against established rules and authority to test its integrity.

Rebellion reveals the wickedness of the heart and should be dealt with through punishment of some sort.

Proverbs 22:15 ESV

Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him.

Proverbs 23:13–14 ESV

Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you strike him with a rod, he will not die. If you strike him with the rod, you will save his soul from Sheol.

God’s Example

Love, mercy, grace, Forgiveness, long-suffering and restoration are at the center of God’s character and therefore are at the center of his discipline as well.

God gives clear expectations with clear consequences.

Genesis 2:16–17 ESV

And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

Over and over in the Bible we see “If - Then” statements from God.

God’s relationship and love for his children is never in question.

Romans 8:35–39 ESV

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

God’s love demands discipline.

Hebrews 12:5–11 ESV

And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.” It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

Chastening is instruction or lecture.

Scourging is corporal punishment.

God’s discipline will yield the peaceful fruit of righteousness.

God deals with rebellion completely different than he does ignorance.

Dispelling the Myth of Corporal Punishment.

Corporal Punishment or Spanking is legal in the State of Georgia in both families and schools as long as it doesn’t cause bodily injury or is excessive.

Corporal Punishment is not the only method God uses to teach and train in the Bible.

The maturity level of the child must be determined for the right course of action.

Side Note: Reasoning must be done at appropriate ages:

There is no reasoning with a two year old

5 - 8 reasoning begins

9 - 13 two way reasoning begins

14 and up conversations and conclusions can be drawn.

Discipline Stratagies

Step one: Biblical Instruction for teaching and training.

Step two: Path correction to establish the way of the Lord.

Step three: Warning with clear expectations and consequences.

Step four: Corporal Punishment or privileges revoked.

Step five: Isolation and/or confinement.