4 Key Words to a Happy Home! - Part 3

The third key word to happiness is SELF-DISCIPLINE:

Self-discipline is acquired only gradually and sometimes painfully through external discipline. A generation ago we entered the age of permissiveness, when children were allowed to make their own decisions, do their own thing. Today psychiatrists are almost universally agreed that instead of making children happier, this permissiveness has been a tragedy for both children and parents. It has led to drinking, drug abuse, crime, broken homes, and an alarming increase in teen-age suicides. Until children reach enough maturity in judgement and character to administer self-discipline, they must be guided by their parents. In Ephesians 6:1-3, the Apostle Paul says, "Children obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. Honour thy father and thy mother (which is the first commandment with promise) that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest live long on the earth". Obedience implies definite restrictions. Parents must emphasize with children that some things are right and some things are wrong, and must see that their children observe the limitations. But when instruction fails and discipline seems necessary, it must never be done through frustration or anger, but always with love. The apostle says in Ephesians 6:4, that -fathers are not to provoke their children to wrath, but nurture them in the chastening and admonition of the Lord. If this is done right, children actually love and respect their parents more, for they realize their parents love them enough to worry over and correct them. As the writer of Hebrews says in Chapter 12:9, “Furthermore, we had the fathers of our flesh to chasten us, and we gave them reverence" Thus, chastening one in the right way may for the moment seem "grievous", yet the writer says it "yields peaceable fruit to them that have been exercised" by it (Chapter 12, verse 11).