[Prayer]
Today’s message is from Hebrews 12:3-13. It’s about God’s discipline for those he loves. Do you think that discipline is a sign of love? Verse 6 in today’s passage says, “The Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son.”
As we read today’s passage, remember as always, that we are reading the word of God. He is the Creator of the heavens and the earth and of all things, including us. He holds everything in his hands, including us. Do you think what he has to say is important? It’s important. He speaks to us through his apostles and prophets; what they have written is his word to us!
Also, as always, I encourage you to read your Bibles every day. Study and meditate on the word of God. It sustains your life.
Now let’s read the passage—Hebrews 11:3-13. Remember, we are reading the word of God.
3Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.
4In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. 5And you have forgotten that word of encouragement that addresses you as sons:
“My son, do not make light of the Lord's discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you,
6because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son.”
7Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father? 8If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons. 9Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live! 10Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. 11No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.
12Therefore, strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees. 13 “Make level paths for your feet,” so that the lame may not be disabled, but rather healed. (Hebrews 12:3-13)
Hebrews chapter 11, which we have just gone through over the last four weeks, gives us examples of people who have lived their lives by faith in God. It’s all about trusting that what God promises he will do. It’s about trusting God. It’s about knowing that God’s promises are priceless—that there is absolutely nothing here on earth that we can seek after or hold onto that can even remotely approach the value of what God has promised those who love him.
Hebrews chapter 11 is about people who gave up the comforts of this life—some even let themselves be tortured to death—in order to receive what God had promised. It’s about faith. Without faith, it’s impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. (Heb. 11:6)
Now, to lead into today’s passage, let me quote the first two verses of chapter 12 (today’s passage starts with verse 3). Listen to verses 1 and 2:
1Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. 2Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. (Hebrews 12:1, 2)
The great cloud of witnesses are the people who the writer of Hebrews spoke about in chapter 11. A witness is someone who gives a testimony. This great cloud of witnesses are testifying to the greatness of God’s promises and the confidence they have in God to fulfill what he has promised. (Witness, by the way, is martyr in Greek. Martyr means witness.)
The writer of Hebrews compares living a life of faith with running a race. If you want to win a race, you can’t slack off. You have to throw off everything that hinders. Jesus is out example. We have to follow him. For the joy set before him he endured the cross. It doesn’t say what the joy set before Jesus was, but I know that he rejoiced to obey his Father in heaven and that he rejoiced to be able to save us from our sins and that he rejoiced that he was able to call us his brothers and lead us to glory. For the joy set before him Jesus endure the cross and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Now let’s go on to today’s passage.
Verse 3 says, “Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.” You know, you can read about and hear about what you ought to do and how you ought to trust God until you are blue in the face, but if no one around you is doing it, it’s really hard to do it, yourself. It’s easy to grow weary and lose heart. This verse is telling us—God is telling us—not to look around us but to look to Jesus and to look to the word of God. If we do that, then we will be witnesses to those around us. We will encourage others by our lives!
“In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.” (Verse 4) Apparently, the people the writer of Hebrews is addressing were complaining about how hard things were for them. And they probably were hard. There was certainly persecution. They were probably poor and had trouble supporting themselves. People didn’t want to hire them—or maybe they were fired—because they were Christians. That still happens today—and even in this country, depending on where you might be working. You might be fired if you don’t uphold the theory of evolution, or if you oppose abortion, or if you think homosexual practices are sinful. But, the writer of Hebrews says to them and to us, “You are still alive. You have not been tested to the point of having to give up your lives rather than deny Jesus.”
I don’t think any of us have been challenged to the point of giving up our lives either. How should we think about the possibility? We should certainly be prepared for it. We can’t think, “Oh, that will never happen to me,” or “That could never happen here.” And we certainly can’t think, “God would never let that happen to me.” But, “Everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. That’s the word of God. How do you prepare? The word of God and prayer, the best way to prepare for every situation. And, by the way, if you are living a trouble-free life, maybe you aren’t trying to live a godly life in Christ Jesus. If the devil doesn’t consider you a threat, he probably won’t bother you. And you know what else? Just because you are having trouble, don’t assume that it’s because you are living a godly life in Christ Jesus. There may be another reason. That’s what the rest of this passage is about.
Let’s look at verses 5 and 6:
5And you have forgotten that word of encouragement that addresses you as sons:
“My son, do not make light of the Lord's discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you,
6because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son.” (Hebrews 11:5, 6)
You know, when I was young, I would hear about people who seemed to be having all sorts of trouble. They would be saying, “I can’t understand it. God must be punishing me for something (boo, hoo, hoo).” When you are punished as a kid, did you usually know why? I know that there are times when we were punished wrongly (and times when we thought we were being punished wrongly), but we usually knew why we were being punished. I think the people who acted as though they couldn’t understand why they were having so much trouble, really knew why.
And, do you know what else? I think the “God must be punishing me” people really wanted to hear someone say, “No, God loves you. He would never do anything like that.” But, you know what? God punishes us because he loves us. He has said so through the writer of Hebrews and also, a thousand years earlier, through King Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived (the wisest man at least until Jesus came, anyway).
Frequently, for the Lord’s Supper, I read these verses from 1 Corinthians 11:
28A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup. 29For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself. 30That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep. 31But if we judged ourselves, we would not come under judgment. 32When we are judged by the Lord, we are being disciplined so that we will not be condemned with the world. (1 Corinthians 11:28-32)
God does not want us to be condemned with the world! This judgment is not vengeance. Vengeance is what happens in the final judgment for those have rejected Jesus. This judgment is correction. Some of them were sick and some had apparently died—they had “fallen asleep”. I personally don’t think the ones who had “fallen asleep” went to hell. I don’t think they were even necessarily the most guilty. What they lost by “falling asleep” was the opportunity to serve Jesus more during this life. But the rest of the body of Christ was deprived of their presence. When one part of the body suffers, every part suffers with it. When one part is honored, every part rejoices with it. (1 Cor. 12:26) The entire church was being punished, in this case. As a church, we are all responsible for rebuking and correcting and encouraging each other in Christ. Did you notice that the point of this passage is to avoid God’s discipline? “But if we judged ourselves, we would not come under judgment.” Let’s avoid judgment!
Let’s look at verses 7 and 8:
7Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father? 8If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons. (Hebrews 12:7, 8)
Well, the writer says that we should be encouraged when we are disciplined. If God didn’t discipline us, it would mean that he didn’t care about us. He cares about his sons (and daughters, too). Fathers usually don’t care about illegitimate children. They abandon them. But, our Father in heaven cares about us. It says, “Endure hardship as discipline.” Discipline is something you endure. It’s not something pleasant. But we need to be encouraged that God loves us and cares about us and doesn’t want us to go to hell.
James 1:2-4 says:
2Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. 4Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. (James 1:2-4)
I’m not sure whether I have ever rejoiced in trials. Maybe I have. And I definitely think it’s possible. (For one thing, if God tells you to do it, it must be possible.) God doesn’t test us in order to cause us to fail. But if you really believe that God is training you to be mature and complete and that you are making progress toward that goal, you will rejoice.
The James passage doesn’t say anything about the trials either being discipline or correction. They might be discipline, but it seems reasonable to assume that they are not—that they are simply training toward maturity. The writer of Hebrews says, “Endure hardship as discipline.” I think both passages are talking about trouble and hardship. How do you tell whether you are being corrected or simply trained? I’ll say more about that later.
Let’s look ahead now to verses 9 and 10:
9Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live! 10Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. (Hebrews 12:9, 10)
You know, in the culture of the people to whom this is written, Jewish people who all knew the word of God—we know they knew the word of God because the writer freely quotes from it—in that culture, I think illegitimate children were relatively rare. These days it’s not necessarily so. Fathers abandon their children. Fathers may not discipline their children at all. Sometimes they take out their anger on their children for no good purpose (or, more likely, on their girlfriend’s children). It’s not discipline for the good of the children; and it doesn’t bring about respect.
Jesus called his generation a “wicked and sinful generation”. But the Bible generally assumes that parents love their children. Jesus told them, “If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that?” It was assumed that people loved their own families—but it’s not necessarily so these days. This generation seems to be more wicked and sinful than Jesus’s generation.
Discipline and correction are good. Not everyone thinks that though. I read somewhere that someone wrote that if you spank your children, they won’t respect you—the exact opposite of what the word of God says. (“We have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it.”) The reason that was given for your children disrespecting you was that they would disrespect you because you had lost your temper. Evidently this person who wrote this thought that no father would spank his children unless he had lost his temper.
As I have already mentioned, the writer of Hebrews quoted Solomon in today’s passage. It’s a quote from Proverbs 3:11 and 12. It’s about God’s discipline for those he loves. He treats them (us, that is) as sons. Let me quote some of the other things that God spoke through Solomon about loving your children (I was going to say disciplining your children, but these verses are about loving your children through discipline and about the consequences of lack of discipline.) I’ll just quote these in the order they occur in Proverbs:
Proverbs 13:24 –“He who spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is careful to discipline him.” Do you love your son or do you hate him? (This applies to daughters, too.)
Proverbs 19:18 –“Discipline your son, for in that there is hope; do not be a willing party to his death.” Well, do you want your son (or daughter) to live or to die? Would you murder him or her—be a willing party to his or her death? (Maybe the thought enters our minds at times, but we wouldn’t do it.)
Proverbs 22:15 –“Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline will drive it far from him.” The “rod” is not an option. We are sinful human beings in a fallen world. Folly, the word folly really refers to sinfulness. In Proverbs, it refers to someone who is morally deficient—someone who is lacking in sense and is generally corrupt. (That’s from a Hebrew lexicon.) The rod of discipline will drive it far from him.
Proverbs 23:13, 14 –“Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you punish him with the rod, he will not die. Punish him with the rod and save his soul from death.”
Proverbs 29:15 –“The rod of correction imparts wisdom, but a child left to himself disgraces his mother.”
Proverbs 29:17 –“Discipline your son, and he will give you peace; he will bring delight to your soul.”
These are not my words, but the word of God. (I think it was in Minnesota back in the ’90’s that they passed a law making any punishment that is intended to inflict pain illegal. Apparently they hate their kids and want them dead. He who spares the rod hates his son.)
This last Proverb I quoted, “Discipline your son, and he will give you peace; he will bring delight to your soul,” is why God disciplines us as his children. God wants us to bring delight to him, just as Jesus brought delight to him. God wants us to share in his holiness (it says so in verse 10 in today’s passage).
Let’s look at verse 11:
11No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. (Hebrews 12:11)
Do you think God’s discipline, his unpleasant discipline, produces a harvest of righteousness and peace—or does it produce grumbling, anger and complaining? You have to be trained by it! If you don’t accept God’s discipline as from a loving Father—a loving Father who sent his one and only son that whoever believes in him will not perish, but have eternal life—if you don’t accept God’s discipline, then you won’t be trained by it and there won’t be a harvest of righteousness and peace. And this all has to do with fear of the Lord! (And I’m preaching to myself here, too.)
I mentioned earlier that there might be a question when you are having trouble about whether you are being disciplined and corrected or whether you are simply being taught to persevere. I don’t really have a definitive answer, but I think generally we all know when we are disobeying God. There is conviction by the Holy Spirit. If you’re not sure, pray. Pray in any case.
5If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. 6But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. 7That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; 8he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does. (James 1:5-8)
Don’t be double-minded.
I ran across something in Haggai the other day. I’ll read it. This from Haggai 1:5, 6: