A while back, my wife and I had completely shocked our “married with young children” church peers with a revealing statement about our methods of discipline. “We don’t spank our son”, we confessed. He generally hasn’t received “time outs” where he is to sit quietly on the couch for 10 or 20 minutes to think about what he has done either. As a matter of fact, we try not to raise our voices in rebuke. Our friends have been horrified by this. It is completely contrary to my upbringing, so my siblings, and older nieces and nephews are often disgusted at times too. Our son has sensory issues. He is overly sensitive to yelling, tone of voice, and volume, because these are perceived acts of aggression. We know that traditional forms of discipline do not work in our family. We are relearning a new system of discipline different than the one we were raised with.
Discipline was taught and modeled to me as being about control. The important thing is who has it, who must get it back, who deserves it, who has a right to it, etc. That is control of an overall situation, of the child, and of the child’s will. Children of course, should never be in control, parents and adults should stop at nothing to keep it. I don’t believe my child should be in control. However, I don’t view discipline as being exclusively about control. Many generations previous to my own have reinforced the “exclusive control” parental philosophy and strategy. Some have used this Bible verse and others to back up their claim.
He who spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is careful to discipline him. Proverbs 13:24
Is this proverb telling parents whoever loves their child will discipline them with a rod? If they don’t, they obviously hate the child right?
My son never was able to “get” the concept that Mommy or Daddy made his butt hurt because he disobeyed. I believe he has been incapable of connecting that particular cause and effect relationship. He is incapable mentally or physically of following through on a 10 or 20 minute time out on the couch to “process his actions”. That never worked for us, but it does work for others as a valid method.
In the verse mentioned, the word discipline actually means training. Parents are to train their children, which often includes praise and punishment. It is also used in these other passages:
Proverbs 19:18 Discipline your son, for in that there is hope; do not be a willing party to his death.
Hebrews 12:7 Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father?
The second half of Proverbs 13:24 simply states that if you as a parent love your child, you will be careful to train her up, or discipline her. That sounds agreeable. It is my guess that most parents desire their children to grow, mature, and be complete as a person - polite, respectful, contributing, and respectable adults.
The beginning of this same verse seems more disturbing at first glance. If you do not hit them with a rod, it will indicate you hate your child. Actually that is not what the verse teaches. Neither the Old, nor the New Testaments abdicate child abuse! That would be inconsistent with God’s character.
There are at least four words in scripture that can be translated “rod”. The word chosen in Proverbs 13 could be an iron rod or scepter for ruling (Psalm 2:9), a rod or staff as a Shepherd uses to comfort and guide (Psalm 23:4), a rod to correct or punish a slave (Exodus 21:20), an animal (Leviticus 27:32), or a child in training (Proverbs 13:24, 23:13, 19:18).
One way to loosely paraphrase Proverbs 13:24 could be:
A parent that shows he cares for his child will correct, comfort, lead, guide, rule, and even punish them as needed. That parent will carefully train them to be a functional adult in society.
In my family, we have tried a variety of methods of training, praise, and punishment with our emotionally disabled son. It has taken a lot of mistakes and headaches. One attempt that worked well was a check mark system. When he was younger, he received, I think, one dollar per week. If we had an issue of willful defiance or breaking rules, he received a check mark. Each check mark costs ten cents off the dollar at the end of the week. This began to help him associate that there are consequences to his actions, rather than punishment only.
One particular afternoon a few years ago at Ponderosa, we had “issues”. We talked to him about his actions, consequences, and specifically a check mark when we get home. He was okay with that, understood the safe boundaries and began to settle down. Unfortunately, a woman from a nearby booth walked passed, leaned over and impatiently sneered, “Give him a check mark for me too!” That was enough to set him off again.
Often care givers of special needs children feel inadequate in properly training their children. Sometimes it may take relearning new rules and methods. Just as each person is different, each disability is different and therefore each method of training should be different. The rub comes when others in public give the looks, make the comments and sometimes escalate a potential bad moment toward getting worse.
The Bible teaches us that we are the parents. We are the authority that decides how, when, and why we train our children. The point is to train them, to guide them, and to correct them as needed. I understand discipline or training is a biblical absolute, but the method for each child can be flexible or relative.
