God's Discipline

Many of us have heard, over our lives of faith, reflections on Proverbs 3:12 - that God disciplines those He loves. That the discipline of God is the act of a loving Father who cares about the well-being of His children and who wants nothing but the best for them. We have heard comparisons about His discipline to the more familiar earthly discipline we might have experienced as children - such as the smacking of a hand when reaching for a hot stove or a short period in time out to cool our jets. 

As I was preparing to write a reflection on this passage and this idea - that God disciplines those He loves - I confess I was thinking about some of these same things. And thinking about how I wanted to reframe and resay them in my own way, something new. Something to help us all (because I always write to myself first) think about this in a new way. 

Then, I read the heart of the passage again. 

God disciplines those He loves. 

Parenting is different today than it used to be. It's different than it was when I was growing up. (I'm about to be 40, just for reference.) Back then, you loved your kids. You wanted what was best for them. You wanted them to grow up to be well-adjusted, productive members of society. Your aim in life was to mature them, to make them into the kind of adult who could make this world a better place. You loved them, so you disciplined them, but you did your best to make sure they understood that you loved them. 

I have spent several of my recent years working in the local schools, with middle-aged children. I have some nieces and nephews of my own running around. They have friends. I have friends who have kids. 

Parenting today is different. 

Parenting today seems to take an approach that says, "I want my kids to love me." I want my kids to be my friends. I want my kids to think the world of me. I want my kids to appreciate what I'm doing for them. I want my kids to have fun being around me. Yes, parents today still love their kids, but the emphasis in today's parenting seems to be on making sure that our kids love us. 

We could trace this through a whole host of cultural movements, ways that our thinking about this or that or the other have changed over time. But that would be a distraction here. Anyone honestly looking at the way that parenting has changed even in the past 20 years or so can see the dramatic shift between wanting to raise a well-adjusted, productive member of society...and wanting whatever adult your kid turns out to be to be one who loves you back and doesn't carry whatever baggage or trauma or whatever that generations like mine have been convinced they collectively carry. 

So when I read this passage, this reflection, that God disciplines those He loves, I wonder how today's youngest generations can connect with that. I wonder how they feel about the idea of being loved. I wonder if they even recognize it. I wonder how being a generation that has been raised to love changes their understanding of God's discipline as He loves them. 

Once upon a time, God was like a good Father, who disciplines His children because He loves them. He has never been one of these more modern dads who chooses to act only in ways that will make His children love Him. 

I think that one little shift has a lot of power to change an entire generation's understanding of God. 

I know it changes mine.