Devotion 7.26.23

Hebrews 12

"“My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline,

    and do not lose heart when he rebukes you,

6 because the Lord disciplines the one he loves,

    and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.”

I have been listening to a digital copy of Jordan Peterson's "12 Rules for Life" (Canada, Random House, 2018). It is fascinating. I first heard Peterson interviewed a year ago, but I had heard favorable comments about him.

Peterson is fascinating in that he's very well-educated and well-read, a clinical psychologist by trade, but he's grounded. He isn't the random professor in front of the class who is absent-minded and wanders off topic, then wanders from the room because his mind switched to a phone call he forgot to make before he came to class. Peterson is clear, concise, and he makes his point which may offend the listener yet is hard to argue with. 

His chapters in his book are the rules themselves, and chapter five is, "Don't let your children do anything that makes you dislike them." It's a trip down how to raise your child well, and also it is a painful reminder of those things I failed to do as a parent.

In the chapter, he notes what a parent does that makes a child adapt behaviors that can, in the long run, be detrimental to their mastery of life skills. Allowing your child to behave in a manner that is unfit for the occasion is one such area he discusses, The fit being thrown for the world to see and hear, while the parent remains passive, counts to three, then four, five and six while the child remains loud and out of sorts as people begin to take notice. The parent who sets few or no boundaries for the child leaving broad latitude for the situation is another area he discusses. Rules and boundaries are meant to be set, not negotiated with by a two- or three-year-old (or older).

Not disciplining your child, actively, leave him or her unable to master life skills to deal with the chaos we call life, as Peterson notes, God's discipline His children, us to help us master skills necessary to navigate the chaos of this world, a chaos created at the Fall of Adam. God created order in the six working days of creation in Genesis 1 as Robert Kolb notes in his book on faith, The Christian Faith (St. Louis, Concordia Publishing, 1993). Chaos was reintroduced thanks to disobedience by Adam. God has been disciplining us ever since.

As a parent, we do these things because we love our children. Our sinful nature makes us resistant, but God, who is faithful and just, does the same with us because He loves us as well.

Pray for wisdom and guidance as a parent, mentor, guide or one who is turned to for advice. Ask God for strength, because kids will test those boundaries (especially in those teen years). Ask God for clarity, because, as Peterson notes, in the end, we want to "like" our children.