18. Chasten thy son while there is hope, and let not thy soul spare for his crying. {for...: or, to his destruction: or, to cause him to die}
Christian parents! carefully study the word of God. See here our Father's wise and loving discipline with his children. “Like as a Father, he pitieth his children.” “As one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort you.”† Yet when his children need chastening; though the flesh cries — Spare; though every groan enters into his heart,† he loves so well, that his soul spares them not for their crying.† He uses the rod; yea, if need be, heavily.† He will wither their brightest comforts, children, or property, if they turn them to idols; and this, “not for his pleasure, but for their profit.”† And what child has not blessed him, that he did not refrain his discipline, till it had done “its perfect work”?
Is not this then our pattern and our standard; setting out the sound principle of a Christian education? “Fathers, provoke not your children to wrath; lest they be discouraged.” (Colossians 3:21.) But let not the rule — chasten — spare not — be “a hard saying.” Is not tenderness for the child a cover for the indulgence of weak and foolish affections? There is much more mercy in what seems to be harshness, than in false tenderness. (Chapter 23:13, 14.) Let the child see, that we are resolved; that we are not to be diverted from our duty by the cry of weakness or passion. Far better that the child should cry under healthful correction, than that parents should afterwards cry under the bitter fruit to themselves and children, of neglected discipline. ‘Eli could not have devised which way to have plagued himself and his house so much, as by his kindness to his children's sin. Parents need no other means to make themselves miserable than sparing the rod.’† Yet much less of it would be needed, did they govern, as they ought to do, by the steady decision of a word, a frown, or a look.
But the great force of the rule is its timely application — while there is hope. For hopeless the case may be, if the remedy be delayed. The cure of the evil must be commenced in infancy. Not a moment is to be lost. “Betimes” (Chapter 13:24; 22:15) — is the season, when the good can be effected with the most ease, and the fewest strokes. The lesson of obedience should be learnt at the first dawn. One decided struggle and victory in very early life, may, under God, do much towards settling the point at once and to the end. On the other hand, sharp chastening may fail later to accomplish, what a slight rebuke in the early course might have wrought.
But is there not too often a voluntary blindness, that does not choose to see what it is painful to correct? The false notion — ‘Children will be children’ — leads us often to pass over real faults, and consider their tempers and waywardness as too trifling to require prompt correction. And thus sin, winked at in its beginnings, hardens in all the strength of deep-rooted corruptions. Whereas — who would neglect their most trifling bodily ailment, which might grow into serious results? If they cannot be argued with, they must be controlled. How often have we found in after-life the evil of fixed habits, which early correction might have subdued with far less cost of suffering! (1 Kings 1:6; 2:24.) Oh! what grace and wisdom is needed to discipline our minds, judgment, and affections to that tone of self-government, which will enable us to train our children practically for the service of God, and for their own happiness!
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