In the counseling world, there is a condition known as enabling. It is a part of some dysfunctional relationships when one tries to help or protect another, but actually ends up promoting or adding to the problem.

An enabler makes accommodation for the other person's destructive behavior. Often this is done with the best of intentions. The effect, though, is that it actually reinforces the wrong behavior. The enabling individual may perceive what he/she is doing as "Christian"--after all, we're supposed to forgive; we're told to "turn the other cheek"--but the result is that the person continues in in the harmful, destructive pattern.  "Turning the other cheek" is not he same as "turning a blind eye." Sin is sin, even in those we love, and allowing it to go on while making excuses for it is not loving the perpetrator. The Bible also instructs us to "speak the truth in love" (Eph. 4:15), in order that "we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming" (4:14).

Discipline is not a bad thing. Remember Proverbs 3:11-13: "My son, do not despise the Lord's discipline and do not resent His rebuke, because the Lord disciplines those He loves, as a father the son he delights in." Its not fun and its not always easy to discipline another. We run to deliver God's words of edification and encouragement, but we hesitate and balk against delivering His words of discipline. What would have happened to David, I wonder, if Nathan had refused to deliver the word of God? Whether making excuses for an alcoholic, lending money to someone who refuses to work, giving in to a child having a tantrum, or simply ignoring on-going sinful behavior, when our motive is to love that person with the love of the Lord, "doing good" and "being kind" means bringing discipline. Of course, our own motives in the process need to be examined. Our call is to be God's vessel, not to act out of pride or self-righteousness. By making yourself available to God, perhaps you will see a change of behavior; perhaps you will only plant a seed that another will water and another will tend. Love your enemies with the love of the Lord. Though He loves, He does not enable sin, because sin unchecked will keep the sinner from Him. Be kind and merciful, love the sinner but hate the sin, "speak the truth in love," and who knows?--God knows!--what the result will be.

Heavenly Father, help me not to add to the problems of another by enabling, but help me to speak the truth in love, that by Your Holy Spirit, he or she may be turned to You. Amen