Posted on 11/19/2020 6:40:48 AM PST by Pilgrim's Progress
“Chasten thy son while there is hope, and let not thy soul spare for his crying. A man of great wrath shall suffer punishment: for if thou deliver him, yet thou must do it again” (Proverbs 19:18-19).
“Chasten thy son while there is hope,” if you wait until they become a teenager, you might as well forget it. Anyone that has raised kids knows that there is a certain point when the child leaves childhood and develops into a pre-adult which is accompanies with a hardened heart and a developed personality. The twig that was bent has now grown pretty much into a crooked tree. The time to straighten out the trunk was when it was still flexible.
“Chasten thy son while there is hope,” notice that this really isn’t a suggestion. It is a command straight from God to do it or else. This does not mean that a child left to itself cannot later come to Christ and become a new creature, but that saved man will not be what he could have been if he had learned to control his passions and develop his character while still in his formative years.
“. . . and let not thy soul spare for his crying,” anyone that has raised children knows what this means. A kid can cloud up and rain in seconds flat when he sees that you are about to utilize the board of education upon his seat of wisdom. Kids are expert at knowing how to tug at the sympathies of mom and dad. Even though it is hard, you have to pretend that your heart is not breaking as you inflict a certain degree of pain upon their behinds to correct them. The child will actually appreciate the fact that his parents are in control and have set good boundaries for them, even though they have to go through the ritual of seeking pity. They don’t probably know it, but they will end up being disappointed in the long run if you let the tail wag the family dog.
You don’t want to allow yourself to appear to be so hard that you seem to be mean and cruel, but again if the punishment is fair and they’ve been warned, don’t miss that God-given opportunity to direct your child in the right way that he should go. Your grandkids will even be grateful in the long run. By sparing them, you are really hurting them more.
When a child begins to start manipulating you, at the age of 6 months to a year, then you can start to manipulate it. Don’t wait until their character is formed before you begin to help God form it for good. If you wait until they reach the terrible twos, it’s too late. You already have a monster on your hands. That’s the difference between the kid that has a tantrum in the aisle of a store and starts ripping things down off the shelf and the kid that stands there and watches him.
“A man of great wrath shall suffer punishment: for if thou deliver him, yet thou must do it again.”
Great wrath is just uncontrollable. Some wrath is expected in the right time and under the right circumstances, but this is a man that flies off the handle in a destructive way at the least provocation. This guy can’t control it. You deliver him once, and he is right back at it exploding again and in trouble again. This may well be the man that was once a child that was not chastened while there was still hope, as in verse 18. It is better off just to let this man suffer the consequences of blowing his temper and see if society can’t correct his foolishness.
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