Definition of BRUISE
1
a : an injury involving rupture of small blood vessels and discoloration without a break in the overlying skin
Somehow when most Americans hear "bruise on a 4 year old" they automatically assume that it was black and blue. A bruise by the dictionary definition can be only a reddening of the skin.
If you can use a rod (or similar instrument, being obedient to God's Word) on a child and not leave a mark at all, you must have a child with a blood condition (opposite of a free bleeder) who cannot get marked when struck by a rod.
Some of you people have been SO hoodwinked by modern psychology that you join sides with those who are against the CLEAR instructions in God's Word! About 100 years ago, this discussion would have never happened in the USA. If you were "acting out" at the neighbor's house, it was a well understood thing that the neighbor would "wear you out" (some leaving black and blue marks at times), and then when you got home, your parents would do the same. If you were at school, the teacher had the same rights (and used them). The people of this country wholeheartedly accepted what God's Word teaches ... until modern Psychology came along and toned it all down.
I'm 47 years old, and I WELL remember my precious grandmother going outside and getting a switch (a slender branch from a tree or bush) a striping my legs and buttocks like a candy cane with distinct red whelps (that lasted for hours and days) when I was a pre-K. She did my mom the same way when she was growing up! Some of you would join in with the wicked people and have my precious grandmother spend 100 days in jail. Too bad, you can't get to her. She is with the Lord now, and you will never reach her. She raised 4 respectable, respecting, diligent children who knew how to submit to teachers, bosses, etc and became very successful and wealthy in life.
My mom (poor abused child with red, white, and possibly blue at times on her legs and bottom) graduated as an RN, and kept that profession for 45 or so years. My parents raised 3 very successful children in the same (abusive by your terms) way. One a pharmacist, another a teacher, and another a translator.
You see, when external discipline is applied, then as the child grows, there is a formation of enough internal discipline to cause him to achieve great things in life. Why? Because his parents didn't spare the rod.
I never had any children of my own, but I foster parented a child who was on Ritalin, Wellbutrin, and Depakote before I got him at age 12. When I got him, and started administering the love and discipline and structure that God's Word teaches, he NEVER took another pill! He stayed with me until he was about 18. He had many cases of redness of the skin color, but now he THANKS me for it, and tells others that I taught him how to respect. Before I got him, he had been in mental hospitals.
The USA that we had (about 100 years ago, and further back in our history) was one that produced respecting, respectable hard working industrious people. Even though many were not Christians, there was enough respect for the Bible to make an effort at obeying it in the general population. With a firm understanding about severe consequences for wrong action, it was even easier to lay a foundation for the gospel to be preached and for people to understand and accept it (the REAL gospel).
If you all want to soften the message of God's Word to fit our generation's definition of discipline, it is fully your prerogative, but if you rear a lazy disrespecting rebellious brat who never is able to come to an obedient relationship with God because you as a parent would not carry out God's Word, then the blood of that child will be on your hands.
