An older woman in our congregation, watching me correct my daughter a little too sharply after a long day, pulled me aside afterward and said one sentence I have never forgotten: “Correct the behavior, but never let her doubt that you delight in her.”
Paul’s instruction not to provoke children to anger, but to raise them in the Lord’s discipline (Ephesians 6:4), had always read to me as being mainly about the child’s behavior. That conversation reframed it as being just as much about my tone, my patience, and whether correction came wrapped in evident love or in frustration. I still get it wrong plenty of days. But I have never stopped trying to correct in a way that leaves no doubt about the delight underneath it.