Yes, that is what the Bible calls Solomon in 1 Kings 3:12, where God says of Solomon, “I have given you a wise and understanding heart, so that there has not been anyone like you before you, nor shall any like you arise after you.”

The book of Proverbs, written by Solomon, is called the "Hebrew Child Training Manual" because it is there that he deposited his wisdom in the area of parenting. All of Gospel Parenting’s books, DVD's and these newsletters are all based on child training principles gleaned primarily from Proverbs.

For example, the teaching in Hebrews 12 equating the discipline of God to a loving father chastising his son is based on Proverbs 3 and includes direct quotes in verses five and six. Paul, in Ephesians 6 and Colossians 3, bases his child training comments on Solomon as well.

Woven throughout Proverbs, Solomon mentions four different, possible stages our children go through as they grow to adulthood. It would be well for us to recognize them and listen to the world’s wisest man as he instructs us on how we can assist our children to traverse the journey successfully.

Gospel Parenting seeks to inform and instruct parents in what the Bible says about training our children. As we have discussed over the past few weeks, that includes properly administered corporal punishment. That is what lies “beneath us,” our responsibilities as parents in the kingdom of God. However, learning to spank our children properly, though extremely crucial, is not the essence of parenting. Parenting begins with what is “above us,” our relationship with God. Unless we understand clearly and have experienced the gospel of the grace of God in our lives, how can we implement gospel parenting properly? What is “the gospel of the grace of God?”

Years ago, I was a member of a student Christian evangelistic organization that aggressively witnessed to college students on university campuses. With the advantage of 45 year hindsight, I can now see we had two major problems as we presented the gospel:

1.) The gospel we presented, which we called the Four Spiritual Laws, was an incomplete gospel. We preached that we were saved by faith alone, but we were sanctified (we grew in our faith) by our good works—our diligence in the Christian disciplines of Bible reading, prayer, obedience to the law of God, church attendance and our faithfulness to witness to unbelievers. In other words, we must assist God in one aspect of our salvation, sanctification. This is the incomplete gospel for which Paul excoriated the Galatians for believing.

2.) The gospel was presented in an attempt to try our best to obey the Great Commission, i.e., fulfilling a God-ordained task– Jesus’ command for us to go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature—and we often trampled all over the individual to whom we were witnessing in the process. They were often only converts to add to our numbers and not people whom we loved. We were preaching our Four Spiritual Laws rather than listening to the hearts of those to whom we were speaking. Our motivation was the law of God. We used the law in a way we should not use it, as a standard to try to obey, and failed to use it in the one way we should use it--as a mirror to expose and convict us of our sin.

One of the major criticisms of this organization was that the Four Spiritual Laws was a canned presentation of the gospel. Surprisingly, that was not the problem. We were simply trying to help young staff members and college students, to, as Peter says in 1 Peter 3:15, “Always be ready to give an answer to every man that asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.”

However, we weren’t answering someone who had asked us anything, or even asking anything ourselves; we were only preaching to anyone who would listen (and to some who wouldn’t) what we thought was the gospel in order to try to keep the law of God—to go into all the world and preach the gospel.

I believe having in mind a clear concise, even canned, presentation of the gospel of the grace of God is a way to “always be ready,” as Peter says, to be able to communicate clearly what happened at the cross. So, I want to go over a brief outline of that gospel to help you to share it with others--a framework upon which to hang the gospel--as we are asked “the reason for the hope that is within us.” A brief outline of this gospel, along with an opportunity for comments, is on the blog.

We saw last week that in the Bible spanking one’s child is portrayed as one of the ways a parent genuinely loves him and not spanking him indicates a lack of unconditional love. Of course, we don’t intuitively recognize not spanking as a lack of love. We have unconsciously bought Satan’s lie that just the reverse is true: not spanking is loving and spanking is not loving, and our flesh feels like this lie is really true. God must open our eyes to see a reality that is counterintuitive to many. Today, I want to investigate what happens if I have a different idea than God does about discipline and consequently don’t spank my child.

I just returned from a day of having to observe first-hand the results of what happens. For the past three years, I have been a substitute teacher in the public school system in the small town in which I live, subbing a couple of days per week, primarily in junior high school. Let me share with you my observations.

1. In a class of 20-25 students, two or three of them, at the very most, five students, come to class prepared to listen, do as instructed, and learn. The rest are totally disinterested and have the attitude, “I dare you to teach me anything.”

2. Not only are they disinterested, but many are actively antagonistic to any attempts by the teacher to get them to be engaged in the learning process, even to the extent of outright defiance. As a substitute, I am sometimes even mocked and ridiculed if I demand any effort from them.

3. Since spanking is not practiced properly in most homes, and, of course, not by the school, the teacher has no leverage with the rebellious children to make them behave and try to learn. Sitting in the corner, going to the office, and suspension from school are all attempts the school uses but are completely ineffective because the child doesn’t mind any of those things. Br’er Rabbit has no fear of the briar patch. In like manner, in the schools where I teach, there is absolutely no fear of God and His delegated authority. Each day the teacher goes to war in the classroom with ineffective weapons in his attempt to teach.

The Bible clearly warns us that this will be the result of a lack of spanking, and then what the results will be if we as parents decide to trust God and obey His parenting program.

We have been discussing the importance of the unconditional love God designed for parents to supply to their children, thereby helping to give them the security and sense of self-worth that every child desperately needs. However, we didn’t get that from our parents who were selfish sinners just like we are. How can we give something to our children that we don’t have to give? The answer is the miraculous supply of the love of God poured out at the cross. He invariably gives that love to all sinful parents who recognize and embrace their failure and inability to love their children, and then trust Him alone to supply it.

When the young mother in last week’s letter cried tears of joy at the thought of blessing her older daughter with an unanticipated American Girl doll, it is easy to recognize that as selfless love. Attending all a child’s ball games, dance recitals, play performances and being involved with one’s child in all his activities, whether you personally are interested or not, and doing so willingly and eagerly and not from a sense of duty, are also all indications that the miracle of the love of God has been shed abroad in your heart (Romans 5:5)!

But the Bible teaches that there is another indication that is just as apparent, just as evident, as these more obvious manifestations whenever God’s love is being expressed in the parent-child relationship. However, this expression of love is hidden from, and unrecognized by, a huge percentage of Christian parents. Nonetheless, it is an equally sure and unfailing litmus test to detect the presence or absence of parental love for your child. What is it?

Last week I described for you the story of the young mother who bemoaned her inability to provide the selfless love for her children she knew they needed. She perceptively could see that she was repeating with her children exactly what her parents had done to her—they had ignored her as a little child, focusing their attention on her older brothers. She found herself still, as an adult, compulsively driven to fill that love deficit she missed when she was young, leaving little emotional energy for her children. She felt helpless to change.

As we talked, she told me that she had been aware for some time of her problem, and could express it very clearly and eloquently. She was not denying or hiding but facing her sin and owning it, not blaming her parents but simply regretting her own inability to love her children and give herself to them. I could tell that my counsel to her, as related in last week’s blog posting, was received, but only with a tiny grain of mustard-seed faith. She believed, but Lord, please help her unbelief! My words to her, I could tell, seemed too good to be true.

But God begins to work in our lives by always giving only mustard-seed faith. That is where we all begin. As we talked about her family, she related a story that told me that God was already at work in her, totally without her knowledge.