Chestnut Drive Church of Christ

I don’t know about you, but I didn’t believe my parents when they said, “This is going to hurt me more than it hurts you.” My thought then was, “Well, duh! Then don’t do it.” I mean, really, who wants to do something that is going to cause pain to themselves? But then I became a parent and I got to look stupid in my kids’ eyes by telling them, “This is going to hurt me more that it hurts you.” You see, even if my kids didn’t understand what that means, I did. And my parents were right, it does hurt the parent more. Disciplining the kids was both mine and Janine’s responsibility, and I can’t say for sure how it affected her, but I know how it affected me. The kids would go and sulk for a while and, hopefully having learned the needed lesson,  then forget about it. Me, it took hours for me to get over it. I know that corporal discipline is not the accepted way today, but it’s what we did and I didn’t like it! There are other forms of discipline, and we used those too. Regardless of the form it took, if punitive discipline was the call, it hurt me more than them. But I knew that it was an unfortunate necessity if a child were in need of it.

Well, if that is true of our earthly fathers, it is even more true of our Heavenly Father. God does not enjoy seeing us in pain. Much of our pain as human beings is self-inflicted, is it not? When the person who has been an alcoholic all of his life suffers physically and financially in his older years … is that God punishing him or is it the result of self-inflicted wounds? When we are bitter, mean, unforgiving and merciless in our younger years, whose fault it is that we are lonely in our older years? Is that God punishing us, or are we reaping the oats we’ve sown in our lives?

From the very beginning God has taught humans that sin brings with it consequences. Honestly, now, we know about consequences, don’t we? Part of growing up, part of becoming an accountable part of our culture is learning about consequences. One of the challenges of youth is to overcome the temptation to cheat the natural law of consequences. How many people involve themselves in a particular activity, knowing the dangers, seeing what has happened to others before them, but go head long into it anyway thinking, “Well, it won’t happen to me.” What? Are you special? Do you not bleed and breathe like rest of us? Do the laws of physics and gravity suspend themselves for you because you are so special. I really like the approach the anti-drug commercials are taking these days with the “I’ll only try it once because I don’t want to become like him” ads. The only one we are fooling is ourselves. My point is this, friend, the same is true when it comes to sin. Sin is transgressing God’s will (1 John 3:4), or in more simple terms, sin is doing what God says not to do or not doing what God says do. If God, for example says, don’t hate your fellow-man, and you choose rather to hate him or her, that is sin. And just like jumping off the Empire State Building has physical consequences, hating your fellow-man will have consequences. The world you inherited is in the condition it is in because of thousands of years of people before you choosing not to obey God. Often our actions do not only bring consequences to ourselves, but to those around us or those to follow us. Isn’t that the thing that stirs the passions of people who belong to Green Peace or similar organizations? What we do today will affect those who come after us.

God as our Creator and Father has long taught us and encouraged us and even pleaded with us not to sin. As our Creator and Father, He knows what is best for us – physically and spiritually. Alas, however, we do not listen. The result? Pain. Emotional pain. Physical pain. Pain in the heart. Pain in the soul. Death!
Solomon gave us these words of wisdom: “My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord, nor detest His correction. For whom the Lord loves He corrects, just as a father the son in whom he delights” (Proverbs 3:11-12). The Hebrew writer referred to these words of Solomon in Hebrews 12:5-7. He would go on to say that if the Lord doesn’t chasten a person it is because that person is not a son of God. God’s chastening of His children is purely for their benefit … so that they can take part in His holiness (Hebrews 12:8-10). Then, the Hebrew writer puts it plainly: “Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained [disciplined] by it” (Hebrews 12:11).

Sometimes we feel like God only knows how to say “No.” There’s a reason for that. Satan is constantly and consistently pushing us toward sin and death and we seem to ever have our ear turned in his direction. God, therefore, as a loving and protective Father, is ever having to say, “No … don’t do that … it will bring you sorrow and pain and death.” Do we listen? Sometimes … but, unfortunately, God’s warnings and counsel are like the warning labels placed on so many products today – if it is what we want to do, they are ignored because, “it won’t happen to me.”

Dear friend, don’t despise the chastening of the Lord. He only wants to make you holy and to present you with eternal life in Christ Jesus, His Son.