So if you would turn with me
to Hebrews 12, and we will, if not look at, at least read and
consider several passages of scripture tonight. My subject
is the chastening of the Lord. When you speak of that subject,
it's addressed first to believers. As we'll see, the Lord chastens
those that He loves. It doesn't mean that those that
are lost can't glean from it. All of God's scripture is profitable. Let's start with verses 5 and
6. It says, And ye have forgotten
the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children. My
son despise not the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou
art rebuked of him. For whom the Lord loveth, he
chasteneth. he disciplines, he corrects,
and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth." As I said, tonight
I want to talk to you briefly about the Lord's chastening of
His people. I feel as though this is something
that is very misunderstood among believers. Now, when we are chastened,
we are prone to think often that the judgment of God has come
upon us mainly because we understand what we truly deserve. Every
child of God lives with themselves. They know their own hearts. They
fight their own battles. So immediately, when a trial
or tribulation or something comes our way, we think, oh my, it's
God's judgment. But let me clear that up right
from the beginning. Chastening is to and for God's
children. And the chastening, the discipline
of the Lord, is not a curse. And it's not a punishment for
sin. It's truly a blessing from God. God's people can never,
by any possibility, be punished for their sins. You see, God
has punished them already in the person of Christ. Christ, their substitute, has
endured the full penalty for all their guilt and neither can
the justice or judgment of God ever, ever punish again that
which Christ has paid for. What a blessing that is. free
from the law, happy condition. Jesus hath bled, and there is
remission. Psalm 94, 12, let me read it
to you. Blessed is the man whom thou
chastenest, and teachest him out of thy love. The psalmist
says that the man or woman whom God chastens is blessed. Blessed. Chastening is proof of sonship. So let's establish that right
off the mark. Deuteronomy 8.5 says, Thou shalt
also consider in thine heart that as a man chasteneth his
son, so the Lord thy God chasteneth thee. Proverbs 3 verses 11 and
12 say, My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord, neither
be weary of his correction. For whom the Lord loveth, He
correcteth, even as a father the son in whom he delighteth.
Now you're still open to Hebrews 12, look at verse 7. For if ye
endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with what? Sons,
daughters. For what son is he whom the father
chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement,
whereof of all partakers, then ye are bastards, and not sons.
Chastening is proof of the Father's love for us. We as parents, those
of you that have raised children, maybe still are, have corrected
our children because we love them. We do, that's the way,
that's why we do it. Teresa and I disciplined our
children, I'll tell you right now. We believed in spanking.
Had a gentleman one time tell me, said, your children are so
well behaved. And then he said, but you're
too hard on them. I said, brother, you can't have
both. You're chasing those that you
love. You teach them. You correct them. You don't want
them to hurt themselves. You don't want them to hurt someone
else. We teach them at a young age. And they have to be taught,
because we know something about the nature. Now I will say this,
I never, cannot remember one time that I actually enjoyed
spanking my children. I never enjoyed it. That was
another thing as a young boy that I didn't understand until
I had children of my own. Now my mother, as I said, would
spank me more than my father, and I might add a whole lot harder. But when she did, she always
told me, that it was going to hurt her more than it hurt me.
Baloney. It hurt and it hurt bad. And
I didn't see any tears coming out of her eyes, and I didn't
see any red whelps on the back of her legs. But when I became
a father, I knew then that that was so. It hurt me, I think,
more than it hurt them. But Revelation 3.19 says, as
many as I love, the Lord speaking. He said, I rebuke and chasten,
be zealous therefore and repent. The Lord most definitely works
all things together. We know that from Romans 8.28.
He works all things together for good. to them that love God. And I might add that God loves.
It's not just a one-way street, is it? We love Him because He
first loved us. To them who are thee called according
to His purpose. And may we learn by His grace
that we are very often in need of correction and discipline
from our Heavenly Father. We just are. He chastens those
that He loves. And what a blessing it is. Now
why is it necessary for us to be chastened by God? Well, the
chastening of the Lord teaches and instructs us in righteousness.
The Lord often lets the condemned world have their way. Just lets
them go. He leaves them to themselves.
That's all God has to do. To condemn a man or a woman,
just let them go. Leave them to themselves. That's
absolutely the worst thing that could happen to anyone. For God
just to let them go, leave them to themselves. 1 Corinthians
11 32 says, but when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord
that we should not be condemned with the world. God don't let
his people go. God didn't let them go. He corrects
them. He rebukes them. He chastens
them. The chastening of the Lord makes us partakers of His holiness. And it yields unto us the peaceable
fruit of righteousness. If I have the righteousness of
Christ, I can assure you this, it's a peaceable fruit of the
Spirit. Look at verse 10 of Hebrews 12.
For they barely for a few days chasteneth us after their own
pleasure, but he for our profit that we might be partakers of
his holiness. Now no chastening for the present
seemeth to be joyous, but grievous. Nevertheless, afterward it yieldeth
the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised
thereby." Now, where it says chastened us after their own
pleasure, as I said a moment ago, that doesn't mean that our
earthly parents disciplined us finding pleasure in doing so.
Now, I know that there are some sick individuals in this world
that do find pleasure in mistreating their own children and other
children. That's not what this is talking about. It simply means
that while we were children, our parents did what seemed best
to them. Just did the best they can. That's
what we do. We do the best that we can do.
But God is doing always, always doing what is best for us. Always. What a comfort. to know that God Almighty always
has my best interest, your best interest, if we're His, at heart. He's always doing what's best
for us, training us to live as we should in faith and love before
Him who gave Himself for us. Malachi 3 verses 3 and 4 again,
you don't have to turn there and he shall sit as a refiner
and a purifier of silver and he shall purify the sons of Levi
and purge them as gold and silver that they may offer unto the
Lord an offering in righteousness Then shall the offering of Judah
and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the Lord That's what chastening
is. It's the refining and the purifying
of silver, purged as golden silver. Now listen, the attitude with
which we accept the chastening of the Lord is very, very important. God reveals to us that it is
for our profit. That's what we read just a moment
ago. It's for our prophet. That he deals with us so. In chastening his children, God
does not treat us harshly, but gently, with the love of a father. Behold, happy is the man whom
God correcteth. It says in Job chapter 5. Therefore
despise not thou the chastening of the Almighty. Don't despise
it, for he maketh sore. It hurts. It hurts. But He bindeth up. He woundeth,
and His hands make up. I tell you what, hold your place
in Hebrews 12. Turn with me to this one, Psalm 103. Psalm 103. I'm not going to keep you long
tonight, so we have time to turn there. Psalm 103, verse 8. Just a few, four or five verses
here. Psalm 103, beginning in verse
8. The Lord is merciful and gracious,
slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy. He will not always
chide, neither will He keep His anger forever. He hath not dealt
with us after our sins, nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.
That's good news. That's a blessing. Oh, if God
dealt with me after my sins and rewarded me according to my iniquities, I dread the thought. Verse 11,
for as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy
toward them that fear him. As far as the east is from the
west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us. And
notice verse 13, and like a father, like a father, pitieth his children,
so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. For he knoweth our
frame, he remembereth that we are dust. Lamentations 3 verse
31 to 33 says, For the Lord will not cast off forever, But though
he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the multitude
of his mercies. For he does not afflict willingly,
nor grieve the children of men." 2 Corinthians 4, for our light
affliction. You've read that passage. And
let me add this, all that we experience here in this life,
regardless of how horrible the trial or the tribulation is,
The death of a loved one, the sickness unto death, just all
the things that are so afflicting to our souls are but light afflictions
compared to what Christ endured. Our light affliction, which is
but for a moment, but for a moment. My husband was sick for three
years. My wife suffered for four years, but for a moment. In the
overall scheme of eternity, it's but for a moment. "...worketh
for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while
we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which
are not seen, for the things which are seen are temporal."
Everything we see in this world is temporal. It's going to fade away. Job said, I came into this world
naked, I'm going to leave this world naked. The Lord gave and
the Lord is going to take away. But what do you say about that
Job? He said blessed be the name of the Lord. Blessed be the name. He doeth all things well. He
doeth all things well. The only thing dear friends that
we're going to take with us if we know God is the Lord Jesus
Christ and that's all we need. He's the righteousness I need
to stand holy and without blame, unreprovable in His sight before
God. He's all I need. And that's all
I care to take. And I don't want to go anywhere
that He doesn't go with me, and I definitely don't want to go
out to face God without Him as my advocate. How do you plead,
O sinner? In and of myself, I'm guilty.
Can't plead any other way. My heart condemns me. My mind
condemns me. The law condemns me. My sin condemns
me. But my advocate stands up in
that court of law and he says, Father, Your Honor, I died for
that sinner. As old Ed Hill wrote that psalm
many years ago, and mercy said, you let that sinner go free.
And he did. And he said, enter in, thou good
and faithful sir. My, when a father chastises a
son for anything he's done, and the boy does it again, directly,
in a sense it shows that he despises his father's chastening. Now
I know what we are. I know what we do. I'm the worst. I'm sure you think you are. But
you will remember there was a man, a prophet named Eli. He was the
mentor of Samuel the prophet. And God chastened him once when
he sent Samuel to tell him some dreadful news concerning his
sons. We looked at that in a study
not long ago. His sons took the best of the
sacrifices and consumed them upon their own lust. hunger and
they had adulterous relationships with the ladies that worked the
entrance of the temple and Eli knew of it and just let it go.
He didn't reprove them. He didn't chasten them. Those
boys should have been destroyed. They were thieves and adulterers
but Eli kept on the same path ignoring their sin. Eli despised
the chastening of the Lord. Although his ears were made to
tingle when Samuel came to him. And then God did something. His
sons were taken away and then it was too late to correct. It
was too late to chasten. The children were gone. The time
that he might have used to reform had passed. How many of us get chastened
of God and do not bear the rod? I thought about that a lot today. Am I so blind that I cannot see
God's handfuls of purpose that He leaves for me? Am I that blind? Many times when God would have
us rid ourselves of some silly folly, the folly still retained,
we just hang on to it. May we take heed. Could be a
trial from the Lord that we might pray that God show us the folly
and have us to pray that He would take it away. Are the consolations
of God small with us? Then is there some reason for
it? Have we lost that joy we once
felt? Is there a cause for it? I suppose that many a man would
have suffered half what he has if he would but look to the cause
of it. Have you ever walked a great
distance almost limping, and I've done this, that's why I'm
chuckling, because there was just a little bitty stone, a
little bitty rock in your shoe. And you didn't stop to look for
it and get it out. It's like, man, I don't want
to take the time, but stop and untie my shoes and find that,
you know, I mean, it's not too bad. And before long, you're
back crippled. Is there a sin? Is there something
in my life that's causing me pain? Is there one that's afflicting
you? I don't know. But may we ask God that we might
be delivered from it. May we regard and seriously consider
this admonition which speaks unto us as sons. God says, my son, my daughter,
despise not the chastening of the Lord. He chastens those that
he loves. He chastens those that He loves.
Oh, how I hope that that helps us. Always remember this, though. It's not punishment. It's just
that God corrects, approves, chastens those that He loves.
May we love Him enough in return to ask for deliverance of whatever
it is that's not pleasing unto Him.