Discipline as an Act of Grace

The article "Blessings Too Big" on Desiring God described disciplining as a blessing, which is a foreign way of thinking about discipline for me.

So in a healthy Christian home, we spend a goodish bit of time correcting, disciplining, training, and spanking. The path to the proverbial wood shed is well worn, shall we say. The thing that is often hard to remember when the two-year-old is going red-faced and screaming, when everybody’s getting their feelings hurt and fussing — the thing that is really hard to remember is that this is part of the blessing too.

God is sovereign, and he has given you children that fuss and quarrel. If your heart is already bent out of shape, and the next kid that walks by is going to be a sinner in the hands of an angry god, then you’re well on your way to forfeiting the blessing God is trying to give you.

 The line most convicting for me?

[F]or discipline of children to be a blessing, the act itself must be full of Jesus and his gospel of grace.