Discipline or Disaster

 

Discipline your son, and he will give you rest; he will give delight to your heart.  Proverbs 29:17

 

I am still studying 2 Samuel.  David is the King of Israel with many children by several wives and concubines. (The Bible often reports things it does not condone – like multiple wives.)  As his sons are growing up, at a time when David should have been at war with his troops but had chosen to stay home, 2 Samuel 11:4 says, “So David sent messengers and took her, and she came to him, and he lay with her.”  Bathsheba was another man’s wife.  David took her and lay with her.  As we go through the rest of the story he tries to cover his tracks by bringing Bathsheba’s husband home from the battle field so he can lay with her and believe he has fathered the child.

 

That plot does not work, nor do the two other things he tries so David has the husband put on the front line of battle so that he is killed.  God is not pleased by his behavior and judges David like this: “Now therefore the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife.’  (11)  Thus says the LORD, ‘Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house.  And I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun.”  (2 Samuel 12:10-11).  

As we read on through the account of the next few years one of his sons rapes one of  his daughters.  David is furious.  The son used David to get the girl in a compromising situation so he has access to her all alone.  In his fury David does nothing.  There is no righteous judgment.  Not only was David the man’s father but he was also the King, the magistrate who would have heard the case.  He was silent. 

Because of his silence another brother gets involved.  He wants to take vengeance for his sister.  Because David does nothing his next son steps in and kills.  The sword does not depart from David’s house as later that son rises up against David and he is killed by David’s soldiers.   

This started because David had not gone with his troops as he should have.  (2 Samuel 11:1) It continued because he did not resist the temptation of taking another man’s wife to bed.  He made things worse when he failed to discipline his own son’s abominable behavior or to try to vindicate his innocent daughter.  What a mess in his family!  

Some think that David did not say anything to his son Amnon about the rape because he had done a similar thing to Bathsheba.  I would think that because of this David had all the more reason to discipline his son.  He was seeing the consequences of sin and letting sin go.  His sin was affecting his family.  As parents should we not teach our children how our own sin will affect those we love?   

Not spoken in the pages of the scripture but something we have to think about is why David had a son who would plot to rape his own sister (she was a half-sister, having a different mother).  There is an apparent lack of discipline in these sons to begin with.  There are multiple wives and households of David’s children.  Obviously, this was not conducive to having your father’s presence as a standard in your home.  We don’t know how much of the king’s time or discipline  they received.  Based on their behavior it was not enough, for sure.  

The kind of consistent and firm discipline that our children need is as difficult in our society and culture as it was for David.  With two working parents, daycare, schools, television, sports, clubs, and even Sunday school, our children are exposed to all kinds of influences we may not even be aware of.  If we have not done the work at home that God calls to do, they may be lost to us and the influence of the world may be greater than our own.  

The way we discipline our children expresses our concern for them and for their relationship with the Lord.  Proverbs 13:24 says, “Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him.”  This is not advocating child abuse.  One of the things it makes clear is that the child who is not disciplined will know they are not loved.  If we try harder to be a friend than a parent, our children will see it as a lack of love!  A child who does not feel loved by his/her parents will look for it wherever they can get it.  

Our lives set an example for our children.  We can discipline them when they are young and moldable or we can face disaster – as David did – later in their lives.  If we choose to discipline, the next generation will also be blessed, if we choose to be silent about their sin, generations will suffer.  Our discipline in disciplining them is a major factor in determining whether or not they will be a disaster. 

Be careful to obey all these words that I command you, that it may go well with you and with your children after you forever, when you do what is good and right in the sight of the LORD your God.  Deuteronomy 12:28