What life will become without Discipline

We often should remind ourselves how disciplining our lives will make or break the ability to succeed in life’s demands. The success we are concerned with is the understanding between right and wrong. Taking a child into a candy store and allowing them to wander throughout the many choices without supervision will create a learning process. Unless they have been told not to pick up candy that belongs to the store owner, it must be paid for in order to satisfy their desire for sweets.

Adam and Eve were the first to learn what a lack of discipline can do to a life that made their lives unbearable that set a standard for the rest of us. Perhaps they didn’t have anyone, as God, to teach them what might happen if they disobeyed his word of partaking from any tree in the garden except the one in the center.

I mentioned before about my 3 years in the US Army and will tell you the discipline young men and women learn in military service is the best teacher any of us could have received. Adhering to a style of living and working with other people will show respect for those around you. In the army barracks you learn to have that respect for your neighbors personal belongings, and more than once we viewed the response taken when one soldier stole from someone else. The result was what we called a blanket party and the culprit never stole anything again. Some members will become judicious in their learning to not touch their partner’s personal items out of respect for them. This is discipline learned and held as sacred among men and women living together. In battle that premise is the difference between life and death.

There are a lot of young men and women who seem to mature in ways that leave the rest of us older generations wondering what has gone wrong with so much arrogance that sets a bad example for the much younger crowd. With all of the anarchy that appears to rise among the youth that we expect to lead our country in years to come sends a chill down our spines alerting us to a fear wondering where their discipline went. Obviously most of them had no disciplinary understanding. It has become a hedonistic environment that promises little control over right and wrong.

Those who are waiting to hear from administrative employment personnel will perhaps do better if they are veterans. This is not to put non-military personnel at a disadvantage, but discipline is a much needed criteria in business with leaders in charge of industry and commerce. The military prepares viable candidates along with the discipline needed to direct their subordinates.

Even in the Church former military chaplains have an advantage over their counterparts in ordained ministry. The one criterion to understand the emotional and confused minds of those in the pews will require a compassionate background with the souls looking for a deep understanding of sharing with more than close friends and family.

Ralph B. Hathaw