A Resource on Effective Discipline

Shepherding a Child's Heart by Tedd Tripp is an invaluable resource on how to effectively train the hearts of our children through communication and discipline. Tripp advocates spanking as a biblical method of discipline (and certainly one that is specifically mandated by Scripture) for correcting young children. He lays out very clear circumstances in which children should be spanked and suggests many circumstances in which parents must not spank. He makes this type of corporal punishment very deliberate and very loving. He suggests that parents must be fully in control of themselves when they spank and must not be filled with anger. Parents do not punish their children out of anger, embarrassment or retribution, but to teach children that defying authority will bring about consequences. Children must know that God demands obedience to authority and that there are consequences for defiance.