One Mom’s Look at Tedd Tripp’s Book: Shepherding a Child’s Heart
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(Today and Thursday, we’ll be posting two perspectives on Christian parenting. Anne Sokol’s focuses on Tedd Tripp’s popular book on parenting. In tomorrow’s article, Aaron Blumer writes on “The Simplicity of Biblical Parenting.”)
For brevity, I focus here on my disagreements with Shepherding a Child’s Heart—its application of some Scriptures and its overall emphasis. My main concerns are these:
- The book’s focus on requiring obedience as the primary component of the parent/child relationship and emphasis on parental authority as the right to require obedience.
- Tripp’s teaching that spanking is the means the parent must use in order to bring a child back into “the circle of blessing.”
- Tripp’s interpretation that the “rod” in Proverbs equals spanking, that spanking is even for young children, that spanking is the God-ordained means of discipline (which parents must obey) and that use of the rod saves a child’s soul from death.
- His portrayal of any other style or method of parenting in a derogatory manner and training parents’ consciences that failure to discipline as his book teaches is disobedience to God.
These points are the heart of Tripp’s teaching, and while his book contains many truths, it does not communicate the full truth of gospel-oriented parenting, as he claims it does.
1. Is obedience the primary component of the parent-child relationship, and is it right for parents to mainly exercise their authority as the right to require obedience?
For several reasons, I see the obedience emphasis as a frustrating, and even false, paradigm for the parent/child relationship. The truth of the gospel is that my child will never obey me or God perfectly while on the earth. I, an adult, will never obey God perfectly on this earth. The essence of the gospel is that perfect obedience to God’s standards is only achieved by Christ—and in Him, we are free from this exacting burden.
So emphasizing obedience as the primary component of the family relationship, as Tripp does, distorts the gospel and puts our focus on ourselves and our sinfulness—not only because we will always fail, but also because our works are not praiseworthy; they are only acceptable insomuch as they are the Spirit’s work. The gospel focuses us on Christ’s obedience and His complete sufficiency for us. And the deeper we understand and accept that truth, the more we are transformed into His image (i.e., the more we obey). Obedience is the fruit, not the object. Obedience is our joyful freedom, not our punishable law.
Martin Luther wrote:
Therefore the first care of every Christian ought to be to lay aside all reliance on works, and strengthen his faith alone more and more, and by it grow in the knowledge, not of works, but of Christ Jesus, who has suffered and risen again for him, as Peter teaches (1 Peter v.) when he makes no other work to be a Christian one….
Then comes in that other part of Scripture, the promises of God, which declare the glory of God, and say, “If you wish to fulfil [sic] the law, and, as the law requires, not to covet, lo! believe in Christ, in whom are promised to you grace, justification, peace, and liberty.” All these things you shall have, if you believe, and shall be without them if you do not believe. For what is impossible for you by all the works of the law, which are many and yet useless, you shall fulfil [sic] in an easy and summary way through faith, because God the Father has made everything to depend on faith….
Now, since these promises of God are words of holiness, truth, righteousness, liberty, and peace, and are full of universal goodness, the soul, which cleaves to them with a firm faith, is so united to them, nay, thoroughly absorbed by them, that it not only partakes in, but is penetrated and saturated by, all their virtues.1
A better rubric for parenting is developing a loving relationship (which does entail teaching obedience) which prayerfully prepares a child’s heart so that it is favorable to receive the good seed of the gospel. Again, teaching obedience is one part of this. Tripp’s emphasis is wrong and his methods are limited—he claims that communication and the rod are the only “biblical” methods of discipline.
Second, on the subject of authority as the right to require obedience, Tripp writes:
Authority best describes the parent’s relationship to the child. (p. xix)
When your child is old enough to resist your directives, he is old enough to be disciplined. When he is resisting you, he is disobeying…. Rebellion can be something as simple as an infant struggling against a diaper change or stiffening out his body when you want him to sit in your lap. (p. 154)
Yes, loving parenting authority does require obedience, but the extent to which Tripp emphasizes this is mistaken. Though he mentions other aspects of servanthood in authority, his main thrust is authority as requiring obedience, and he goes to great lengths to teach parents exactly how to exercise authority in this manner. Tripp’s book makes this the main factor in the parent/child relationship in a manner that is not consistent with Scripture.
For example, God’s relationship with us as His children is characterized by many things other than His right to demand obedience from us. He emphasizes lovingkindness, rejoicing, longsuffering, compassion, and sacrifice. He meets our true needs, helps us to will and to do His good pleasure, has compassion on us, blesses us—and much more. Tripp gives little attention to how these apply to parenting.
We want to model the entire nature of God—not mainly God’s exercise of authority over us to command obedience. Communicating to my child that God can be trusted because He always is acting in wisdom, righteousness and truth toward us is the more godly path to obedience.
Again, Martin Luther understands:
This also is an office of faith: that it honours with the utmost veneration and the highest reputation Him in whom it believes, inasmuch as it holds Him to be truthful and worthy of belief…. What higher credit can we attribute to any one than truth and righteousness, and absolute goodness?
Thus the soul, in firmly believing the promises of God, holds Him to be true and righteous…. In doing this the soul shows itself prepared to do His whole will; in doing this it hallows His name, and gives itself up to be dealt with as it may please God. For it cleaves to His promises, and never doubts that He is true, just, and wise, and will do, dispose, and provide for all things in the best way. Is not such a soul, in this its faith, most obedient to God in all things?
In His dealings with us as His children, God does nothing like reaching down and spanking us each time we disobey. Sin has natural consequences, but God bears them with us, redeems them, and works in the secret places of our hearts transforming our beliefs and understanding about Him. Greater obedience results. His graciousness is not permissive, but it is very patient—training yet not demanding.
2. Does spanking bring a child back into the “circle of blessing”?
Shepherding a Child’s Heart connects spanking with blessing:
The rod returns the child to the place of blessing…. The rod of correction returns him to the place of submission to parents in which God has promised blessing. (p. 115)
The disobedient child has moved outside the place of covenant blessing. The parent must quickly restore the child to the proper relationship with God and the parent. As the child returns to the circle of blessing, things go well for him. He enjoys long life. (p. 135-136)
The Bible does not support Tripp’s teaching that spanking brings a child back into the “circle of blessing.” Spanking is not endued by God with such spiritual power, nor, in fact, is a parent endued with the power to restore the child. Biblically, confession and repentance restore our fellowship with God and others. Let’s cling to this promise: “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (NASB, 1 John 1:9). Tripp’s made-up “circle of blessing” teaching goes beyond what God says.
Also, the command to obey was given to the child. Just as husbands are not told to make their wives submit and wives are not told to make their husbands love them, parents are not told to make their children obey.
I taught my daughters to obey—starting when they were small—because I wanted their hearts to be sensitive and trained in the things of God. But teaching obedience is only one facet of my parenting.
3. Has Tedd Tripp correctly interpreted the “rod” passages?
Tripp teaches that the “rod” in Proverbs equals spanking, that spanking is even for young children, that spanking is the God-ordained means of discipline (which parents must obey) and that use of the rod saves a child’s soul from death.
God has commanded the use of the rod in discipline and correction of children. It is not the only thing you do, but it must be used. He has told you that there are needs within your children that require use of the rod. If you are going to rescue your children from death, if you are going to root out the folly that is bound up in their hearts, if you are going to impart wisdom, you must use the rod. (p. SACH, 108)
The rod … is the parent, as God’s representative, undertaking on God’s behalf what God has called him to do. He is not on his own errand, but fulfilling God’s. (p. SACH, 109)
Tripp’s use of Proverbs 23:14 (NIV: “Punish him [a child] with the rod and save his soul from death”) is faulty. Only the grace of God saves us from death and from our sinfulness. It is unbiblical to assert that spanking is God’s “means of grace” for saving children in any way. We diligently teach our children to obey, but spanking them is not salvific in nature. In fact, it is usually unnecessary. There are many godly ways we can teach our children to obey: by our example, by physically helping them fulfill our instructions, by meeting their internal and external needs, by teaching that choices have consequences, etc. God does these things for us as His children.2
The book refers several times to this conversation:
Father: “I must spank you. If I don’t, then I would be disobeying God.” (p. 31)
And again, “Dear, you know what Mommy said and you did not obey Mommy. And now I’ll have to spank you.” (p. 103)
In reference to the mother’s actions, Tripp explains that “the issues of correction transcend the present. All earthly punishment presupposes the great day when destinies are eternally fixed” (p. 103).
The conversation Tripp describes suggests parents who are controlled by a parenting formula rather than by the Holy Spirit: “I must spank you.” And linking earthly punishment to the day of judgment is a distortion of God’s relationship to us. As His child, my eternal destiny was decided already, because He punished His Son, not me.
As His children, He does not consistently punish us when we sin. He trains and disciplines us consistently but He is not obligated to punish us. By teaching parents that they are required to spank, Tripp teaches children (and their parents) that—contrary to the gospel—God does punish us consistently for our sins. Because Christ was punished for us, God is free to use whatever methods of discipline He wishes in order to train us and bring us closer to Himself.
Luther’s words are helpful once again:
When I say, such a Person [Christ], by the wedding-ring of faith, takes a share in the sins, death, and hell of His wife, nay, makes them His own, and deals with them no otherwise than as if they were His, and as if He Himself had sinned…. Thus the believing soul, by the pledge of its faith in Christ, becomes free from all sin, fearless of death, safe from hell, and endowed with the eternal righteousness, life, and salvation of its Husband Christ.
Tripp errs gravely in asserting that spanking is God-ordained, that God’s methods of discipline are limited to communication and spanking, and that parents must spank or they are sinning.
The book also lacks adequate attention to age differences and stages of development—a great aid in child-rearing. On this point, Sally Clarkson writes:
The unfortunate thing is that many parents, in the name of faithful discipline, do not understand the differences between babies or toddlers or young children or even teens with all of their hormones, and they exhibit anger and harshness toward their children, act in a demeaning way, while neglecting the cues of the child at each stage. These parents have no perspective for the children themselves–they use a rule and formula no matter what–and often wonder why their children do not respond to them.3
4. Is Tripp correct that any other methods of parenting are ineffective and disobedient?
Finally, Tripp consistently describes other methods or styles of parenting or discipline as ineffective and undesirable. This is a weakness in his argument because other godly methods of biblical training do exist and have been used effectively for many years.
For example, a daughter of Puritan parents, Mary Fish (1736-1818) writes: “They were very watchful over us in all our ways, and they had such a happy mode of governing that they would even govern us with an eye, and they never used severity with us at all.”4
These summarize several of the major errors in teaching and emphases that I have found in Shepherding a Child’s Heart. The book includes several good teachings, but the overarching errors concern me to the point that I do not recommend the book to parents. Those considering promoting this book and its teachings seriously should give these topics a lot of thought.
Notes
1 All Luther excerpts here are from Concerning Christian Liberty, Part 2.
2 According to Clay Clarkson, Heartfelt Discipline, Prov. 23:14 is probably referring to the use of an actual rod on the back of a young man (p. 56).
3 http://www.itakejoy.com/first-time-obedience-really/
4 Joy Day Buel and Richard J. Buel, Jr. The Way of Duty: A Woman and Her Family in Revolutionary America, p. 7
Anne Sokol Bio
Vitaliy and Anne Sokol are missionaries in Kiev, Ukraine. Anne is a graduate of Bob Jones University. She is a doula, childbirth educator, and midwifery student. She blogs at www.birthinukraine.wordpress.com. They have two daughters, Skyla & Victoria.
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Jesus never spanked anyone in the Bible.Jesus never had any children. He could not, therefore, set an example for us in this area.
[C. D. Cauthorne Jr.]John 2:15 And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple, and the sheep, and the oxen; and poured out the changers’ money, and overthrew the tables;Jesus never spanked anyone in the Bible.Jesus never had any children. He could not, therefore, set an example for us in this area.
We aren’t told that He actually whipped anyone,(as in “Bend over and grab your ankles”) but the threat certainly was there. I imagine if He was ‘driving’ people out of the temple with a whip, it isn’t unreasonable to assume that it might have made contact.
But the fact that kids are childish doesn’t erase the fact that at times they are sinful. Both conditions have to be corrected. Paul’s observation that when he became a man he put away childish things reflects the belief that this is what a man ought to do. So childishness is something we are supposed to move away from.
That can certainly be overdone.
Sadly we live in a culture that, on the whole, tries to move kids prematurely out of childhood in some respects while keeping them mired there in others—and on the whole we seem to have reversed what ought to be retained and what ought to be left behind as quickly as possible.
So we’ve got bills in some states that would require sex ed for kindergardeners. At the same time, we’ve got 30 year old guys living with mom and playing video games half the day… and dad’s that dress and act like like they stopped maturing around age 14.
Sad.
About spanking...
There’s a difference between a bad idea and poor implementation of a good idea. No number of examples of the latter is proof of the former. Grab a million people at random and put them on ice skates. Probably 100 of them can skate worth beans. But this says nothing at all about what “skating” can be and should be.
Since school teaching days, I’ve been convinced that the most effective discipline tool any parent/authority has is the one that is hardly ever used. That is, the punishment that is so dreaded that just the thought of it is a powerful deterrent—that’s real leverage. I’m sure I sound callous to some, but you learn that from managing classrooms of 30+ 7th graders. In the case of the classroom, the phone call home was the dreaded tool hardly ever used. It became that by having several options that would be used before that one. And the kids knew exactly how to avoid getting to the phone call scenario.
Any act of punishment you are using constantly is not working.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
Another one of those impossible questions to answer would be how Cain and Abel interacted as children before the Fall. Did they fight over the Lego bricks and Lincoln Logs? “Mine! Mine!” Did they cry because they were experiencing stress and anxiety? If many of the behaviors that children exhibit stem from their sin nature, even if they don’t comprehend their actions, I’d still call it ‘sin’. Again- sin is not imputed where there is no law, and as parents we should take that into consideration, but I just can’t say with a straight face that many of the natural behaviors of children are not sinful at their root.
Maybe that’s putting too fine a point on it, but there ya’ go.
To reiterate, the only objection I had to Tripp (and many others) is the impression that their parenting advice was a ‘formula’ that all can/should follow. I think Tripp’s ideas can work for some people who have a similar family dynamic. But it is unhealthy to simply practice someone else’s theories without thoroughly considering how that person formed their opinions in the first place. Where they are consistent with Scripture, I think you’re safe. Where they go off into specific details, you have to step back and really look at yourself and your kids to see if those ideas would be effective. Even if you experiment a bit, you are not very likely to do any damage. I’ve tried different suggestions I’ve heard or read- adopted some, discarded others. I’ve read parenting books out loud to my kids and asked them what they thought about the different methodologies and family dynamics. Interestingly enough, they know a Biblical concept when they see it, and acknowledge that discipline, however unpleasant it is at the time, is necessary.
A sort of side note- people who have injured or killed their children because they read a book that advised spanking are lunatics. Not even in the Pearl’s books does a sane person come away with the idea that they are advocating beating one’s child with a rubber hose until the kid breaks a bone or stops breathing.
It’s not. It’s just his own method of spanking.
For example:
Parents, you do not have to bare you chilren’s bottoms to spank them. You are perfectly free in the Lord spank them clothed. Search the Scriptures.
(And with the s`xual milieu of the day, I really recommend seriously considering that option.)
And as I have said repeatedly, in the Lord, you are free not to spank them. Love them, discipline them, train them in the happy habit of obedience, yes.
But parents, you are free from many of the burdens parenting gurus are laying upon you and your children.
That reminds me, Tripp’s definition of obedience—w/o excuse, w/o delay, etc—think very, very carefully about whether or not that definition is entirely true, especially the way he applies it. Sure sounds good, but do yourself and your children some good by thinking it out …
Susan - while Scripture is not explicit, I think the implication is that Cain and Abel were offspring of fallen parents. Else, how would they have been included in Adam’s fall? Each of them would have had to also sin individually apart from their parents and then be cast separately out of the garden if they were born before the fall.
Why is it that my voice always seems to be loudest when I am saying the dumbest things?
[Chip Van Emmerik] Susan - while Scripture is not explicit, I think the implication is that Cain and Abel were offspring of fallen parents. Else, how would they have been included in Adam’s fall? Each of them would have had to also sin individually apart from their parents and then be cast separately out of the garden if they were born before the fall.I agree, but either way, it’s a hypothetical question. The point is to differentiate between simple-minded childishness and childishness that is a result of the sin nature.
Why is it that my voice always seems to be loudest when I am saying the dumbest things?
I suspect that if Adam and Eve hadn’t disobeyed in reference to the Tree, the first kids would have done it by stomping a foot and shouting “No!” at Adam.
Would also be awesome to have a detailed account of Jesus’ behavior as a child. We only have Luke 2.52 and context. But perhaps one reason we don’t is that His childhood may have been so completely unlike that of any ordinary child (or not… Joseph and Mary seem to have completely forgotten for a while that He was not an ordinary child!)
But we know what we need to. What is revealed is all the really important info… and what is not revealed must be relatively unimportant.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
[Chip Van Emmerik] Anne - how would you define obedience? More precisely, in what sense can obedience be with excuse, with delay?Chip, I am so sorry, I just cannot address this at this moment. I have a lot of thoughts and would like to explore this, but my husband has been so gracious to let me spend so much time responding to this thread already, i need to take some time off here for rest of the day and we’re going out of town tomorrow, but I may have internet access. I’ll try to write out some thoughts so I can put something here when I get a moment.
Maybe someone else has something to contribute, too.
Maybe start with the thought Rachel posted elsewhere that we can really just teach compliance, not obedience. I think there are good insights in that addmitance. That is not where my own thoughts had gone with Tripp’s words.
… OK, stop talking, Anne. Go be with your husband.
I read part of Clarkson’s book, shortly after it came out. A friend asked me to read it, as she was confused on his interpretation of the Hebrew meaning of na’ar. Aaron pretty much summed it up for me:
[Aaron Blumer] Anne, read most of Clarkson’s case on “young man” several days ago. There are some serious problems there.I believe Clarkson is in serious error here.
The first time I read Ted Tripp’s book, SACH, was about 14 years ago. At that time, I had three children, my eldest was about 10 years old and I was expecting my 4th. I believed at that time, the book was pretty solid. The second time I read this book was two years ago, when our church went through the book, with the video series. At that point in time, I had 6 children, and my eldest was 21-22 years old. I was now questioning a bit of Tripp’s information, regarding the older teens-adult children. The information for younger children I found to be mostly right on. The older teenage section I had issues with that one. As I recall, he was not even touching on accountability, which I think is lacking. I should also mention here, what was on the video series was more often, not necessarily every thing from the book, it was expounded information. I had a hard time remembering what was actually in the book and what was on the video.
I strongly believe when we have several children, of mixed genders, we get a much bigger, broader perspective of the vast differences in personality types and gender issues. We see how little we do know and lean upon the Lord for more tools to work with the children He has given to us. Going back to the culture, Anne, you would have had families with many more children and lots of little ones at the same time. They would not have had the time to stop, every time Jimmy, Johnny or Suzy needed to be held and reasoned with as to why they are not allowed to club their sibling over the head with a rock. I think we lose site of this very important detail when we perhaps have the luxury of time with only a few children, who might be spaced out by several years. These comments are not meant to say having lots of children close together is the way to go, I am simply bringing up this point to emphasize the culture that Anne speaks of, and to put it into perspective with the attempt Clarkson’s has on his wrong interpretation of the Hebrew word.
If we logically look at the idea that na’ar in proverbs is referring mostly to an older teenage child, and that if one believes in spanking, it should only be done to an older child, not younger, we have a problem. Please help me understand how a parent can discipline a disobedient, rebellious child when that child is bigger and stronger than the parent? A child at that stage cannot be easily spanked. I know there are those people who believe that a child is no longer under parental authority when a child hits 18 years of age and in some cases, not until 20 years of age. If that’s the case, then ‘spanking’ for a “na’ar” would be limited to 2-4 years, maybe? We know that many teenage children were married in that culture, so then discipline would not even be an issue, would it? I would argue that this is not the time to be physical in disciplining your children, this is the time to come along side them with the Word of God, with reason, and with steadfast love. It’s when those things fail, that we can see where scripture talks about physical punishment, but that is death by way of stoning.
Anne, I am quoting part of your post from above here. With respect, I have to tell you, when I first read these words of yours, I had conclude, I believe this was part of the problem. You only had the one tool, ‘spanking’ and by your own words here, it does not appear you were implementing it in love, you were angry and frustrated. Any type of discipline that is implemented with anger and frustration is bound to not work, or it will have the appearance it’s working, when in fact it is not.
[Anne Sokol][dmicah] Anne,I believe Anne, if you had used spanking like you are using the other tools you are using now, you might have had much better success. I see spanking in scripture, but I do not believe it’s the only tool we have available. We do have to take into consideration the parent, the child, the situation (such as foster parenting), and everything else.
When my first child was 2, I was a frustrated, spanking parent. Spanking was basically the ONLY parenting skill I had available to myself and our relationship. I was expressing my discipline frustrations to an acquaintance, and she amazingly packed up a box with a billion “gracious” parenting books and mailed them to me here in Kiev. They were not all anti-spanking. In fact, Ross Campbell’s Relational Parenting (hands-down the #1 book I would recommend to parents of small kids), does advise spanking on some occasions, but he has a LOT of things to do that are positive ways of “compliance training” (ha ha). I did a lot of reading, a LOT of learning other parenting skills, ways to help my child obey that were not punishing in nature. It took me several months of transition time, a HUGE mental change from “I MUST teach you to obey me.” to, “how can I come along side my child and help her learn obedience in a way that my manner is Christlike?” … It took me time to wean away from spanking, from threatening spanking, from going from spanking to yelling for control … to learning patient ways to teach obedience.
Respectfully,
Carol
[SACH, 138ff] Obedience is the willing submission of one person to the authority of another. It means more than a child doing what he is told. It means doing what he is told—Without challenge, Without excuse, Without delay… . When they refuse to obey at once, they are not obeying. Submission to authority means taht they obey without delay, excuse or challenge.First, let’s accept his definition in the first line: obedience = willing submission to authority. He then makes a leap to say that this means w/o delay, excuse, challenge.
So, I started thinking about this when Skyla was about 1 or 2. Tripp says to spank “when you’ve given a directive that he has heard and is within his capacity to understand and he has not obeyed without challenge, without excuse, without delay.” (This is in the infancy to 4-/5-yr-old section.) [Note: Are parents who only spank for outright defiance really doing what Tripp teaches?]
I noticed that she was a very intense play-er; she had out certain little toys and she had a thought-out plan and was very intent on arranging them and taking them through very specific movements, and disruption of this was very hard for her to handle mentally and emotionally. It was like she was on another planet.
So, if I were “obeying” Tripp, giving my kid a directive during this intense play time, I saw that I would be working against something in the make-up of her personality. (She plays the same way now some, but it’s not as intense and she very easily handles interruptions for doing things for me.) Should I do this and teach her how these toys were her heart’s idols? Something was not right here.
His whole training routine sounds a lot like training lab rats, kwim. Consistent unpleasant result if you don’t do the words. Not saying behavior modification is totally wrong, but constantly using negative reinforcement instead of positive teaching is a very undesirable style of teaching and discipleship. Was I expecting her to become my little robot? It kind of sounds like it, and I really didn’t want my kids to become unthinking or passive in their compliance—there are times when kids need to say no to wicked authority.
I also thought about the way God gives us commands. For example, I’m waking up. My plan is to go to the bathroom, so I stand up. Immediately, God says to me, “Anne, please go into the kitchen and fry eggs.”
?
How does God give us commands? There are times, when we are really listening to His Spirit, that He will impress on us specific directives. But the usual order of God’s commands are not that way. He gives us commands like “love one another,” “pray always,” “respect your husband,” “give to those in need,” –things we have time to ponder, implement, experience in new ways, etc. When I get up to go to the bathroom, I may remember that I need to pray while I’m getting ready for the day.
Now, having said that, I do teach my kids to obey—that my words have meaning. But I try to do it in a more relational way. This doesn’t mean it’s always pleasant either but it isn’t always unpleasant.
But anyway, About Tripp’s definition, I don’t really see that emphasis in Scripture.
I think, too, although this is not always practical with little kids, that God does want us to be very involved in obedience, in searching out the meaning of His commands, being thinking people as He created us to be. He created us with desires, and He wills and works in our hearts to help us obey. Sheesh, when He withdraws His mercy, we cannot control our disobedient hearts. And when we obey, it’s so interlaced with our sins.
Also, I think maybe we need to be a little more consistent in our teaching about the significance and source of obedience. There are, in the final sum before God, two ways we can be counted obedient. One is that we can obey, without fail, the 10 commandments for our entire lives. Second, we can have faith that Christ fulfilled them for us, and this be accounted to us. In the day when destinies are decided, as Tripp talks about, that’s what really matters. So maybe as parents, we teach our kids the habit of obedience more for the goal of preparing them to obey the faith as God tests and purifies them throughout their lives. (Practical obedience will come of that, and it gets generally hairy trying to talk about or separate faith, sanctification, and obedience.) That’s why I think how we teach obedience can be so crucial.
[Matthew 21:28-32] What do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’ “ ‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. “Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go. “Which of the two did what his father wanted?” “The first,” they answered. Jesus said to them, “I tell you the truth, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you. For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him.Would tripp say neither were obedient?
Maybe doing the will of the father/parent, would be an interesting idea to pursue, as was said so often by Jesus. And even Jesus, in the Garden, didn’t struggle with obeying, but maybe with the hardness of the act.
Anyway, those are some of my thoughts so far.
I think it’s wonderful that God leads parents in various ways. He is so kind to us, you know? I will always be a very imperfect mother. But I am so glad that God has shown me that He still perfectly accepts me in Christ, even with all my imperfections. He is so graciously leading me into deeper knowledge of Him and His character and dealings with us, and He is transforming me. Maybe that is what parenting is all about. He has been so kind in giving me two forgiving daughters, and a husband who loves theology and takes me deeper and deeper into the unfathomable grace of God in accepting us helpless sinners, even making us His dear and beloved children, giving us an inheritance in eternity with His Son.
What wonderful truths we have to build our lives upon and set our hearts on the age to come when our hearts and bodies will be united in perfect love with our very God.
As you come to understand His love, may God’s very fulness be in you, Carol.
God gave directives in Scripture and did expect to be obeyed immediately and with a good attitude (since God looks at the heart and weighs our motivations). Moses striking the rock comes to mind. Jonah is a great example of someone who got put in major Time Out for zigging instead of zagging. But we can only go so far in comparing God’s dealings with our own, because 1) we aren’t mind readers 2) we tend to act in our own self-interest 3) we can’t see the future. Our requirements are always seriously short-sighted compared to God’s. And let’s face it- the tasks we give our kids are usually fairly simple. “Take out the trash”, “Pick up your toys”, “Brush your teeth”. If they know what to do and how to do it, do they seriously need to contemplate those commands before complying?
If the directive is “Be nice to your sister”- that’s too vague. Maybe what the parent means is “Stop beating your sister over the head with the hairbrush.” But if the parent is in the process of teaching the child to be nice to their sister, they should explain what that means and give specific examples of how to implement it. You can order a kid to ‘be patient’ or ‘be kind’, but that doesn’t tell them very much when they are 2 or 3 years old. That is definitely when you go alongside your child and model the correct behavior and encourage them daily. But once they get the picture, they are responsible for what they know.
On immediate, cheerful obedience- It isn’t very often that I give an ‘order’ without qualifying it. IOW, if I want them to clean their rooms, I let them know if I expect them to do it immediately, or have it done by 5pm. If they need to stop playing and pick up their toys, I get their attention first and have them look at me before I give them instructions. If they then delay, that is defiance. If they huff and puff about it, that is a bad attitude, which receives an adjustment. If they don’t complete the task as instructed, that is also disobedience. And as Tripp apparently explains- we are talking about tasks that we are sure the kids understand and are able to accomplish. We aren’t asking the 6 year old to mow the grass and clean the gutters.
But does life happen sometimes? Do they get interrupted in the midst of a task and forget to get back to it? Sure- it happens to all of us. So the idea often conveyed by non or anti-spankers is that a parent who spanks for delayed obedience just walks up to the kid, yanks ‘em up by the armpit and starts whippin’ the fire out of them- this picture isn’t (and shouldn’t be) accurate. If I don’t know what happened to cause a delay, I ask. What a concept. We find out if they were stalling (and thus disobeying) or if they have a legitimate excuse. A parent doesn’t lose authority by asking questions, and the child understands that the parent is going out of their way to be fair.
I also teach my kids as they get older that they are allowed to ask questions and make suggestions when appropriate. This is something they must be taught how to do, and it is a privilege that I expect them not to take for granted. If I ask them to do something, but I’ve forgotten or don’t know something that might affect the situation, they are free to let me know what’s up and then ask how I want them to handle it. If they have what they think is a better idea they are free to offer it. When I consider it, we both learn something, whether I agree to their idea or explain why it won’t work. But kids need to know that if they use that privilege as a stalling tactic or point of negotiation to get out of performing a task, they will lose it.
I thought Carol made an excellent point. Too many parents wait until they’ve reached the end of their rope, and then can’t discipline without losing their temper. Spanking should be calm and controlled and done when the disobedience happens. If a child has done something that receives the ‘threat’ of spanking- well, they’ve obviously disobeyed and should already be over the knee or grabbing the ankles or whatever. There is no 1-2-3 or second chance once it has been established in the parent’s mind that what is happening is disobedience or some loss of self control.
When we delay discipline, we are teaching our kids how many times they can disobey before they receive the consequences they wish to avoid. But it is a very bad idea to ever let a child think they can play footsies with sin or abuse grace and mercy for their own ends.
Teaching the heart and being gracious and using the rod for discipline are not either/or. Our calling as parents is to use both. Our challenge is to learn how to do that in a balanced and appropriate way for each child.
[Anne Sokol] First, let’s accept his definition in the first line: obedience = willing submission to authority. He then makes a leap to say that this means w/o delay, excuse, challenge.Anne, I think you’ve hit on something here…My kids are like this, too, some more than others. (They get it from their mom…In my case, Matt calls it “being on Planet Julie.”) I think there is definitely room in “Tripp-land” (not that my home is Tripp-land, but I do like his book) for wise interaction in situations like this. I think one key is that the child has, as Tripp said, “heard” the directive you’ve given. At our house, that means eye contact at the very least. A child hasn’t heard me unless I’ve made contact with his brain. Something that has proven very helpful for us is to give a child a heads-up that in ____ minutes, I’m going to ask him to be done playing/reading. Then, when I show up ___ minutes later, he’s prepared to listen and move on. As the kids grow older, they’re able to do it without as much preparation. And, IMO, regardless of their personality, they do need to be able to snap back into the real world quickly, since that is where they live at present. :) So, I guess what I’m saying is that Tripp (as far as I can tell) would have no problem with this kind of preparation. He doesn’t advocate giving aimless commands and then coming down hard when they’re not immediately obeyed…or being unreasonable, demanding, or impolite. Kids are people, too, and Tripp spends a lot of time (on the videos) talking about this.
So, I started thinking about this when Skyla was about 1 or 2. Tripp says to spank “when you’ve given a directive that he has heard and is within his capacity to understand and he has not obeyed without challenge, without excuse, without delay.” (This is in the infancy to 4-/5-yr-old section.) [Note: Are parents who only spank for outright defiance really doing what Tripp teaches?]
I noticed that she was a very intense play-er; she had out certain little toys and she had a thought-out plan and was very intent on arranging them and taking them through very specific movements, and disruption of this was very hard for her to handle mentally and emotionally. It was like she was on another planet.
So, if I were “obeying” Tripp, giving my kid a directive during this intense play time, I saw that I would be working against something in the make-up of her personality. (She plays the same way now some, but it’s not as intense and she very easily handles interruptions for doing things for me.) Should I do this and teach her how these toys were her heart’s idols? Something was not right here.
His whole training routine sounds a lot like training lab rats, kwim. Consistent unpleasant result if you don’t do the words. Not saying behavior modification is totally wrong, but constantly using negative reinforcement instead of positive teaching is a very undesirable style of teaching and discipleship. Was I expecting her to become my little robot? It kind of sounds like it, and I really didn’t want my kids to become unthinking or passive in their compliance—there are times when kids need to say no to wicked authority.Totally agree about the “no to wicked authority,” Anne. Good point. What I don’t find in Tripp is the part I bolded…especially “instead of positive teaching,” since that’s what the whole book is about. (He spends far less time on spanking/”negative reinforcement” than he does on positive teaching, as I remember.) He even talks (in the videos) about not wanting to develop robots who don’t understand obedience or who do not reason/think about how their actions either reflect or do not reflect obedience. Robots=Pharisees; Tripp comes down hard on this.
How does God give us commands? There are times, when we are really listening to His Spirit, that He will impress on us specific directives. But the usual order of God’s commands are not that way. He gives us commands like “love one another,” “pray always,” “respect your husband,” “give to those in need,” –things we have time to ponder, implement, experience in new ways, etc.Right…but the pondering, implementing, and experiencing in new ways are, in and of themselves, continuing to obey. We shouldn’t ever “stop obeying” these ongoing commands. If we do, then we are sinning. Failing to submit to God at any point is sin.
Maybe someone already said this, but the daily, mundane directives we give our kids are simpler and more immediate. Their reactions to these directives either reflect willing submission or apathy/defiance/whatever else.
Now, having said that, I do teach my kids to obey—that my words have meaning. But I try to do it in a more relational way. This doesn’t mean it’s always pleasant either but it isn’t always unpleasant.Right…I’m puzzled that you think Tripp says it always has to be unpleasant. (Maybe the videos are different than the book?) He seemed very “relational” to me in the lecture series. I’ve had great fun teaching my kids to obey…great times practicing “come here,” “stop,” and other little games that taught them to hear my voice, etc. And, yes, their attitude toward me does depend on my relationship with them. Am I a cold, condescending giver of commands, or am I an accessible, humble, human teacher of obedience? And, am I myself living a life wholly submitted to God?
Also, I think maybe we need to be a little more consistent in our teaching about the significance and source of obedience. There are, in the final sum before God, two ways we can be counted obedient. One is that we can obey, without fail, the 10 commandments for our entire lives. Second, we can have faith that Christ fulfilled them for us, and this be accounted to us. In the day when destinies are decided, as Tripp talks about, that’s what really matters. So maybe as parents, we teach our kids the habit of obedience more for the goal of preparing them to obey the faith as God tests and purifies them throughout their lives. (Practical obedience will come of that, and it gets generally hairy trying to talk about or separate faith, sanctification, and obedience.) That’s why I think how we teach obedience can be so crucial.For sure, Anne.
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