Many years ago the culture taught that to retrain a child to stop acting badly parents should give them "time out", basically isolating them from the family to think about what they have done.
I have known parents who did this but because there were so many toys in the child's room they acted out by breaking the toys and the parents had to end up spanking them anyway.
God told us how to train our children in a way that sends the message that bad behavior will not be tolerated but we will not issolate from the family as a form of banishment.
God said this:
Proverbs 13:24
"Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him."
Hebrews 12:11
"For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it."
Proverbs 23:13-15
"Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you strike him with a rod, he will not die. If you strike him with the rod, you will save his soul from Sheol. My son, if your heart is wise, my heart too will be glad."
Proverbs 22:15
"Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him."
A child disciplined with the rod will learn not to disobey or act rudely or destructively but will be allowed to return to the family after the discipline as though the sin had not been committed. This is God's kind of love, showing the seriousness of rebellion, disobedience, and rudeness through physical punishment sends the message that sin will not be tolerated but also remain with the child so that he can carry on with his family.
Isolating children to "think about their bad behavior" is foolish at best. Children feel abandoned and unloved when they are isolated. The idea that isolating them will cause them to change their behavior is the opposite of what God told parents to do, it is worldly and destructive.
What a child needs is the physical discipline that does not break their spirit as isolation does. Loneliness is one of the elements of "time out" that creates bitterness and anger in a child.
When we follow the world's ways in anything we are going to see the opposite effects that we hope to accomplish. Satan is the father of lies and will draw believers away from God's way to cause frustration and loneliness.
The goal of discipline is to show that behavior is not acceptable to God and to redirect the attitude of the child, not just to shape them into the mold of the parent. With God's discipline comes instruction from His Word, that the child will see the goal of the parent is to love and help them to follow the ways of God.
I have seen many parents isolate their children in anger, as though they are putting them away because they don't like them anymore, at least this was the message that was sent.
When we discipline God's way the child knows we are doing it to help them learn good things because of our deep love for them. Back in the day we used to hear parents say when they were spanking the child; "this hurts me more than it hurts you" because we didn't like having to do it.
I used to ask my children; "whose fault is it that you are being disciplined?" Their answer would come back "mine", they knew if they had not disobeyed or acted rudely they would not have been disciplined. They also knew I didn't want to have to do it.
Other parents expressed to me that they hated disciplining their children and did it less than they should have because of the feelings they had when doing it.
I said to those parents; "think of it as just a daily chore, I wash the dishes, I make the bed, I discipline the children", this helped me know that it was a distasteful thing that must be done to train the children, it left me with no ill feelings toward my children or toward my need to obey God in this matter.
God expects us to obey His Word and much of what we have to do is difficult because of the culture we live in and the pressure from others to do things the way the world does them.
When we obey God the world will not understand it and will even malign our character thinking we are doing something wrong. The blessing of obeying God outweighs the pressure of the world. We must do what God tells us and leave all those people who want to dictate our lives to God.
1 Corinthians 2:14 "But a natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned."
