Daily Devotional for Friday, December 20

Confronting in Love

"Open rebuke is better than secret love;' Proverbs 27:5.

I was playing basketball in my driveway one evening several years ago when one of the neighborhood boys stopped by to join the shootaround. This was the first time we had officially met, and of course, we struck up a conversation during our game of Around the World. He was probably twelve years old at the time. He talked about his different interests, including that he often played basketball at the local park. The conversation then shifted to sports video games. He explained how his grandmother was going to buy him all of the latest gadgets, from game systems to music players to cell phones. He was so proud of how much she was going to spend on him. I stopped him in the middle of his prattling on and asked him outright, "How do youknow she is going to buy you all that equipment? That sounds like thousands of dollars!"

His response has stayed with me for years because I see it all around me now. He said, quite confidently, "She will buy it all because she loves me, and because I am worth it." I thought his statement was ridiculously arrogant, until my son joined youth soccer, and everyone on his team won a trophy for participation. We were not even allowed to keep score (although us proud dads always knew which team was ahead). There is nothing wrong with loving your children, supporting your children and wanting them to do well, but good parents do not give a child everything he wants. You cannot effectively prepare children for real lifeby awarding them atrophy for simply participating.

Paul was not reproving Peter out of hatred, but out of love, love for his brother and love for God, Jesus and the kingdom work. Your children will eventually thank you when they realize you rebuked them because you love them.

CHALLENGE

"Train up a child in the way he should go:

and when he is old,he will not depart from it" (Proverbs 22:6).

Chris Floyd