My dear readers,

Do You Love or Hate Your Son?

Proverbs 13:24: “He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes.”

“Admonishing or disciplining your son will leave a scar for life!” so claim modern parents. Therefore, DO NOT DISCIPLINE YOUR CHILD! Is this claim valid? Will it leave a scar for life that will never go away?

The claim is valid. It will leave a scar that will not go away, hopefully. The question is, what kind of scar should parents leave behind? Remember that leaving a “scar” of no discipline is also a scar. It is a “scar” of “wrong is right” because of parents’ failure to discipline.

Having scars is how children learn in life. What they experience is what they will remember. None of us remember everything that happened in life. This is good because many painful and hurtful words and events are best forgotten. But there are some things that all of us do remember for life. But are they good or bad things? There is a man who remembers a painful experience he had when he was a young boy. His uncle who claimed to be a Christian “fought” with his father for their parent’s inheritance. His father lost and his family struggled for some time in poverty. As a result, he hates Christianity. His father and uncle are long gone. In his early eighties today, his hatred for Christianity remains.

Every God-fearing Christian parent has a God-given duty to leave behind godly scars for their children to remember for life, which will help them believe in Christ and serve Him until Christ’s soon return.

Proverbs 13:24 teaches us how.

• To Spare is to Hate – Parents must realize their duties as parents. Parents are not friends to their children. The notion of “friendship” between parent and child is nonsense, a concept from the world to destroy homes. Parents must never forget their parental duties to have oversight over their children from their birth. They must know that their children were conceived in sin and born sinners with depravity in them. The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life are inside every baby’s heart. They will not willfully sin until they enter the age of accountability. The age of accountability varies from child to child. But from observation, it would be from Primary One age. Once they enter the age of accountability, they will choose to sin and no longer sin unknowingly. That is why it is crucial to start disciplining children as early as possible.
  
  Since all children are born with a sinful nature, they are pre-programmed to obey the devil’s voice once they are old enough to understand. The world’s education and seduction through movies, games and entertainment are geared toward capturing our children’s minds and hearts. Through these influences, the lusts of the flesh and eyes and the pride of life will inflame and burn in their young, impactful hearts. If Christian parents do not discipline their children when they are young and allow sinful behaviour to go unpunished, the message to our children is that it is okay to be lustful, greedy and wicked. When our children are not disciplined for wrongdoing, is that not hating our children?
  
  The older they get, the more challenging the godly influence from parents becomes. The children will continue to be impacted toward carnality as they mix with their worldly friends in the world. With the virtual world at their fingertips, they do not need to leave their rooms to receive the diabolical influence. It is too late to discipline once the world grips their hearts and minds. To discipline carnal teenagers or young adults with Christian truths becomes a battlefield. It is easier to conquer a fortified city than to turn the hearts of our grown children away from the world to God. Their reactions are frightful and sinful, like the people of the world. How do parents discipline children who might be bigger than them?
  
  Many parents who learned the hard way can attest to these tragic confrontations that have destroyed the peace in their homes. Parents either pay no heed to their children’s carnality and sin or admonish them with preparation for a verbal battle that they know is futile. Yet how can they keep silent when they see their grown children ruining their own lives? The further these children swim into the deep end of the pool of carnal quicksand, the more difficult it will be to pull them out with little or no damage.
  
  The parents will cry daily to God and beg for mercy, knowing that they cannot turn the clock back and begin all over again in bringing up their children. As time passes, they realise the futility of their efforts in admonishing their wayward children. They can only cry to God for mercy to save their children’s souls. The regret of “If only I had used the rod when they were young” would plague their hearts. This may not go away till they close their eyes for the last time, with the hope of seeing their wayward children in heaven one day by God’s mercies. They may realise, too late, that they had “hated” their children when they failed to use the rod and to teach them godly truths.

• To Chasten is to Love – Christian parents who love their children will discipline them. Using the rod to discipline is to use an actual rod. It does not mean to use the rod all the time but rather as a last resort after verbal admonishment and rebuke. If the verbal admonishment is sufficient to stop the children from sinning, then there is no need to use the rod. But very often, every Christian parent will realise that they will have to use the rod. The rod is known as the rod of correction. Proverbs 22:15: “Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child; but the rod of correction shall drive it far from him.” The rod must never be used abusively. It must be used judiciously to let the children know they have done wrong and must not repeat it.
  
  The time to chasten is betimes, i.e. “early”. When the child demonstrates sinful behaviour like throwing tantrums, discipline must begin. When discipline is delayed, parents are already teaching the child that they and Christ accept sinful behaviour because Christian parents represent Christ to teach what is right and wrong. If they love their children, they will discipline them as early as possible so that the Christ of the Bible will be taught and represented biblically to their children. Their children will experience Christian life and behaviour before they become Christians in the future because they would have experienced the goodness of Christ, what holiness is like, and that God is holy.
  
  God teaches this kind of Christian parenting to all believers. That is why God says that our children are holy in His sight because of one Christian parent. How much greater a blessing it will be when both parents are Christians, and they have the fear of God in them to bring their children up in the fear and nurture of the Lord according to the Scriptures? 1 Corinthians 7:14: “For the unbelieving husband is sanctified by the wife, and the unbelieving wife is sanctified by the husband: else were your children unclean; but now are they holy.” Children brought up in a Christian home where the Bible is the only rule book will experience true love, i.e. Christian love, where wrong is taught through the judicious use of the rod to correct and not punish.

The godly scar is the result of rebuke for wrongdoing through pain, physical and emotional. If parents do not realise this, and when they are foolish enough to believe the godless teaching of no discipline and do not use the rod of correction, they hurt and ruin their children’s lives. It is worse if these are “Christian” parents who teach their children from birth that wrongdoers are not punished; they are coddled. If their

children die in their sin (since wrong is not
disciplined), the thrice holy God Most High on the day of judgment will not coddle them but will cast them into the fiery hell because of their sins! Parents, use the rod of correction lovingly and teach your children that they do not need to live in sin, i.e. in the way of depravity, but they need to live in Christ.
Christian parents, bring up your children the Christian way.

Love your children; do not hate them.