Dear Matt,
Church leaders should never overstep their boundaries and discipline the childrens of others.
The idolatry of Baal and Estarte worship in the old testament was a terrible form of family abuse complete with infanticide and putting your wife out as a temple prostitute. Idolatry certainly does involve the sacrifice of the family. The family is critical in God's administration and should be preserved, nurtured and built up. At another time, I would enjoy a fellowship on idolatry, but not just on the idolatry in the lc but in our broad society. It is rampant.
Surely, surely we had a big flat spot on being a proper spouse and parent according to the Lord's revelation and plan and purpose. Another topic that could be very helpful to us all. We all need help here whether or not we ever heard of the lc.
Regarding the discipline of other's children. I am not familar with this practice. Perhaps some elder somewhere scolded a child. There was an older brother in Dallas who would call down a young person in an ad hoc manner but he came from the old southern culture where the community was watching out for all the children and if I was riding my bicycle in an unsafe manner the neighbor would be quick to give me a little scolding. I remember one time when at a Jr. High conference, I scolded some of the junior high boys for some little misdeed like jumping up and running for snacks before dismissal or some little thing like that. For some reason that irritated me and I said something about that behavior being like Bozo the clown. I remember it well because the father of one of the boys sat me down and put me in my place. I did apologize for I should have never slandered any of the children. I had been pounding this into the other brothers who were working with the young people. Never slander or curse the precious young people.
While I can remember the Bozo comment very clearly, the story told about the young sister being called down before 16 elders from two states is as foreign to me as a man from Mars.
When and where did something like this happen? Thankful Jane never was in the church in Dallas. We did not have a long table around which 16 people could sit. I do recall such a table in Houston. I was not there!!! I never heard of it!!!
As far as naming families which came up to proper Biblical Standards in raising children, that is a tall order. On this one nearly all christians today are way short. But I can name many families who loved their children dearly as well as each other. Perhaps I could nominate the family of Mike H. as my example of an all star family.
(But then Mike and his brother were already in high school. Therefore we probably did not have time to mess them up.)
There was another family that my wife and children considered to be just about perfect. My boys in rare sober moments
would tell me that the sons of .... were just about perfect in the way they respected their parents, did their chores, completed their homework etc. They would say things like they could never get away with the stuff they did at our house. I would agree that brother and sister .... were surely much better parents than Sheryl and I and we should all aspire to be like that family. Then lo and behold the children had some serious problems. How could this be? Later, praise the Lord, they were all restored and at last report were outstanding citizens and believers in Christ. It may have been due to the classic "over protected" children may go overboard for a while which Mike H. pointed out. How to protect but not over protect? I very real delima. I surely do not have the answer.
In Christ Jesus there is hope for us all,
Hope, Don Rutledge