Study 59

Fatherly discipline to produce family likeness

The writer to the Hebrews says, ‘Strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees! “Make level paths for your feet,” so that the lame may not be disabled, but rather healed’ (Heb. 12:12,13). Your suffering has a particular purpose. There’s a lameness in your walk and your instructor has noticed it, so he’s prepared a specific training programme which has been designed to bring healing. But there’s a risk involved. Instead of the limb being healed, it might be put out of joint and result in a condition which is worse than it was before.

Don’t miss it

It’s vital that you handle your Father’s discipline well and don’t miss his grace (Heb. 12:15). His goal for you is glorious: ‘God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness’ (Heb. 12:10). He wants you to carry more of the family resemblance, to be more like him. That’s why ‘the Lord disciplines those whom he loves’ (Heb. 12:6).

If you belong to God you’ll almost certainly have experienced his discipline. But if you’ve never been conscious of his discipline, it’s possible that you don’t yet belong to him. You may attend church and be quite a moral, even a prayerful person, but you may not yet be a child of God. If you’re questioning whether you really do belong to his family or not, let me encourage you to speak to someone who claims to be ‘born again’ about this.

Don’t forget it

In his wonderful grace God will discipline his sons and daughters for their good. Indeed many could testify that in dark seasons they discovered more about their dependence on God than at any other time. They also learned more of his specific love for them and his kindness through their suffering. Lessons that you learn in the midst of God-ordained trials and pressures aren’t supposed to be forgotten; they’re meant to be highly valued as proofs and evidences of his grace towards you. Never entertain the enemy’s lie: ‘God has forgotten you’. Instead, receive difficulties with faith and confidence, celebrating the fact that God is for you and that his goal is to transform you into the image of his glorious Son.

To Meditate On

Everything God does is good.

‘The Lord is good to all; he has compassion on all he has made’ (Ps. 145:9).

‘(Jesus) has done everything well’ (Mark 7:37).

‘And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose’ (Rom. 8:28).

Food For Thought

Read John 15:1-4

Pretend that you’re one of the branches of a rose bush and the gardener is headed towards you with the cutters. What misgivings could you be having:

   1. about him?
   2. about what he’s going to do?
   3. about the result?

Who knows more, the gardener or the rose?

Read Job 13:15. Do you share Job’s confidence in God?
Read Job 42:10-17. How fruitful was he?

To Consider

Consider your most recent trial. What lessons did God teach you through it?

To Learn

‘Let him who walks in the dark, who has no light, trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God’ (Isa. 50:10). Learn this verse.

To Be Inspired

‘Discipline may be either corrective or remedial. It may be sent for the purpose of correcting some sinful attitude or action, or to remedy some lack in our character. In either case, it is administered by our heavenly Father in love, not in wrath. Jesus has already borne the wrath of God in our place, so all adversities that come to us, come because he loves us and designs to conform us to the likeness of his Son.’

Jerry Bridges, Transforming Grace, NavPress, 1991, p. 183.