It was the teachers and extended family who called me mean for disciplining my children. Because their influences all week long were the world all around them, they refused to obey, it was a nightmare much of the time.
This is the world our culture has provided because of the self esteem influence that indoctrinated those who knew nothing of God's principles. Now many adult children are disrespectful, willful and resistant to correction or instruction.
I went through continual criticism from extended family and the school system for my attempts to follow the Bible in discipline. I even had aunts and uncles of my children tell them to their face in front of me that I was mean and they didn't have to obey me.
The children learned to treat me with contempt, even in subtle and mocking ways because of the culture around them. Is it any wonder we are in the mess we are in these days?
2 Timothy 3
So many people forget that someone had to die to cover the sin of mankind. They forget that Christ did our dying for us, the death we should have endured. Those who think they can keep their salvation by not sinning, do not understand what salvation is. It is Christ Who paid the penalty, while making into a new creation anyone who wants to be cleansed from their sinfulness.
2 Corinthians 5:16-18
"16 So from now on we regard no one according to the flesh. Although we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.
17 Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away. Behold, the new has come!
18 All this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation:…"
Ephesians 2:9-11 "…9 not by works, so that no one can boast.
10 For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance as our way of life.
11 Therefore remember that formerly you who are Gentiles in the flesh and called uncircumcised by the so-called circumcision (that done in the body by human hands)—…"
Since we are not perfect, but He is perfect, He was the only perfect sacrifice that could pay for our sin.
Any attempt we make to be good, is dung in God's sight. It is only Christ, Him alone, who is perfect and able to wash away our sins with His blood.
1 Peter 1:18-20 "…18 For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life you inherited from your forefathers,
19 but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or spot.
20 He was known before the foundation of the world, but was revealed in the last times for your sake.…"
John 1:29 "29 The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world."
John 3:16-19
"16 “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.
7 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him.
18 Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is already condemned, because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.
19 And this is the verdict: The Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness more than light, because their deeds were evil.…"
Anyone who thinks they are remaining saved because they are not sinning, walk in darkness still. It is not possible for some who are prideful, to understand that we are not capable of saving ourselves or keeping ourselves, it is all a work of Christ in us, continually changing our desires because we want Him to do so. Christ will not come to dwell in anyone who thinks they are good enough or sinless, He will reject them.
Only those who know they are helpless to be anything they should be, confessing that to Christ and trusting in Him, will become born again.
