It is a false god, an image, we worship if we imagine our God to be so loving and so good that He will never permit His children to suffer. With all the suffering there is in the world today, it is no marvel that that is a popular doctrine. What does God say? We will study His word to see.
Greetings to you, my friend. Thanks for inviting us into your home for Bible Study In Search of the Lord's Way to become a Christian-- and to live a faithful Christian life. There is coming a time for both of us, when we will have to give account to God for the way we have lived this life. We believe the Lord's way to come into a saved state with Him is the only way, and His way of life is the best way that has ever been introduced to the family of man. It is only by Bible study that we will ever know the Lord's way. Well, we pray we will both be blessed by our study today.
We are continuing our study about God. I wonder if we are all worshiping the same God! Well, we all know we are not! Don't we? Don't we know that now, really? We are witnessing a huge influx of a lot of immigrants into our society nowadays. Of course, we all know that we are a nation of immigrants, so we welcome those who come legally. But, quite naturally, they bring their gods with them. Some worship Allah, the god of their Islamic faith. Buddhists worship Buddha. I know that because I have been in their home and witnessed it, and Hindus and others bring other gods. And, many of us think that and we say that we worship the one holy and true God of the Bible. But we really don't, do we? We are worshiping an image of Him. Oh, I don't mean we have a graven image sitting up on the mantel. No, no, no, not that. We worship a mental image of Him.
Our message today is titled, The Discipline of God. If you think you might want a free CD or audio cassette tape or a printed copy of it, simply mail your request to In Search of the Lord's Way, P.O. Box 371, Edmond, OK 73083. Maybe you would prefer to do it by telephone. That is good; we will even pay for the call if you do. We are not here for all the money we can persuade you to send us. This program is a ministry of churches of Christ. Oh yes, our telephone is 1-800-321-8633. Ken Helterbrand is going to lead us as we sing. And after the hymn I will be back.
Our text today is from the book of Hebrews, chapter 12. We are going to begin reading at verse 4 and read through verse 11. “You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin. And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons: My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord, nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him; for whom the Lord loves He chastens, and scourges every son whom He receives. If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten? But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons. Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live? For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness. 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 by it.” So the reading through verse 11. Now let us go to God in prayer. Our Father who art in heaven; yes, we address you as our Father. You are the Father of our spirits, the only Holy Father that we have. And we come to You through the name of our Lord Jesus Christ as You have taught us to give You thanks for the blessing of being your children and we come to the realization of it; and having been born into your family, the church. We pray your blessings upon our study today that we may know more of your true nature and how to deal with the problems of life because You are with us all the way. Amen.
There are many descriptive names for God in the Bible. He is called "Lord of Hosts," “Lord,” "Creator," "the Almighty," "the Holy One"-- well, as I said, there are many others. Of all the names and descriptions that we have of Him in the Word probably the one that is best loved is "Father." It was introduced by Jesus Christ himself. In the Old Testament, God seemed to be somewhat distant and men were very cautious about approaching Him. One of the reasons for so much of the idolatry that we read about in the Old Testament was that an idol was something that they could see and something that they could touch, and something that seemed closer to the worshiper than God really seemed to them. For God is a spirit, you know (John 4:24). Another thing about the idol: that it was not as terrifying and that was not as terrifying and not only so, but what was expected of the worshiper was not as great as it is now. One of the great beauties of the New Testament is that men may come close to God through Jesus Christ.
The Scripture says, "For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying know the Lord, for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more." That is Hebrews chapter 8, verses 10 to 12.
Well, we must take extra care that we don't let our father-child relationship with God become too common, or too familiar. We had a lesson on that much earlier, or a little bit earlier this year, which we titled: "The Holiness of God." We mentioned how God said to Moses at the burning bush, "Do not draw near this place...and Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look upon God" (Exodus chapter 3, verses 1 to 6). In the New Testament the apostle Peter taught us the same reverence for deity. Jesus had used Peter's fishing boat for a pulpit. It appears that perhaps He wanted to be thankful to Peter and to the others for the use of their boat, so He said to them, "Launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch." Oh, Peter said, "We have fished all night, Lord, and we have caught nothing." Nevertheless, they did so and they caught so many fish they nearly sank their boat. When Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!" You read about that in Luke chapter 5, beginning at verse 1. Neither our earthly father nor our Heavenly Father should ever become a pal or a "good ole buddy" to us. Fathers deserve and must maintain honor and respect of their children. We like the figure of a father not only because of the feeling of closeness like that, but also because he also provides our physical needs, as well as the protection and wise counsel that he gives us. And, remember, all that is given and received as an expression of his love.
The verses we read awhile ago contain several very important lessons about this father-son relationship. To fully understand what they are saying, we need first to note some things that are mentioned earlier in the book. It's always good-- even essential-- to understanding the Scriptures to consider a passage in its context. You see, the book is written to Hebrew Christians, people who had given up Judaism to become Christians. And it is best understood when we remember that they were suffering the severest kind of persecution for having done so. Their kinsmen in the flesh, their long-time Jewish friends and business partners, who were not converted to Christ, were persecuting them. John 12:42-43 says that, and this happened only a few years earlier, "...even among the rulers [of the Jews] many believed on Him [meaning, Christ, of course}, but because of the Pharisees they did not confess Him, lest they should be put out of the synagogue; for they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God." Well, some of these to whom the epistle is written in Hebrews, were thinking that they had bought into a bad, bad cause. It's believed that some of them had, and others were thinking about turning back to Judaism. Well, the book is written to discourage that sort of thing and to show the superiority of Christianity over Judaism; and to encourage them in their new found faith.
So, the book begins (chapter 1, verse 1) with a description of God's communication with men over the centuries. In the Old Testament He had spoken through the prophets and angels, and sometimes in dreams, but in these "last days," meaning the Christian age, He speaks through His Son, Jesus Christ. Read that entire first chapter of Hebrews. It shows the superiority of Christ over even angels. And chapter two, verse one begins another thought: "Therefore,” he says, “we must give the more earnest heed to the things that we have heard, lest we drift away from them.” So, as Christians they had a superior revelation of God's holy word. Chapter three exalts the Priesthood of Christ over that of the Old Testament. He is a more qualified and meaningful High Priest as well as the ultimate and perfect sacrifice for sin. Well, throughout the book then, there are many strong encouragements for Christians to endure the hardships and trials that come upon them. Until, we are nearing the end of the letter and there's our text for today, Hebrews 12, verses 4 through 13.
The paragraph begins with two important observations. First, "You have not resisted to bloodshed striving against sin." Oh, they had suffered all right, but not to bloodshed. When we get to pitying ourselves about all we are so suffering, well it might help us to remember that we haven’t suffered to bloodshed. And second, "...you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons." Apparently they had forgotten that basic truth that was present in their relationship with God. As any good "father," God sometimes disciplines His people because He loves them as sons-- or his children.
By way of comparison to show the supremacy of the new over the old, the writer quotes a lot from Old Testament. And He does it again here. He reminds these people (and you and me, of course) of the words of Proverbs 3:11: "My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord, Nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him; for whom the Lord loves He chastens, and scourges every son whom He receives." Oh say! We need to know that now as much as they needed it then. We hear it preached so much today that God is so good and He just loves us so much that regardless of what we do or say or think, well, He wants nothing for His children but happiness and riches and good health, and if we only believe, well, He provides all of that for us. But, the Bible says, "If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten?" We probably hear "punishment" in that word "chasten." The King James and the New King James versions use the word "chasten," too-- both of them. And the New American Standard Version renders it "discipline." Whatever version you are reading, in the verse God is picturing Himself as a father who teaches and trains the son, but He sometimes does that by allowing a son to suffer various trials.
One of the important truths of this passage is that good fathers correct their children and good children respect their fathers for that correction. Correction is a part of discipline. If a child is doing something that's dangerous or evil or prejudicial to others, or to himself, or he is disobedient to his father, a good father will correct that child. Correction is done primarily by teaching, but also by example, exhortation, encouragement and even by punishment. In any or all of that, the child needs to respect the father by listening and obeying and correcting his misbehavior. Most children do; especially after they have grown to maturity and they reflect on their childhood they appreciate it.
No, now I am not saying that all our "troubles and trials" are God-sent. However, I have, and I imaging you have seen parents watch carefully and with loving concern while a child of theirs ( I did it with mine) learns the harm that can come upon them by encouraging and-- say, swimming out into deep water. Oh, we can warn our children of dangers, but sometimes it takes something stronger than that. Sometimes father, after many cautions, watch as a child learns by his own experiments.
The Lord says, "But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons. Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed good to them, but He for our profit always, that we may be partakers of His holiness" (verses 8, 9 and 10). "Partakers of His holiness": oh, we had one whole program in which we studied God's command to "Be holy, as I am holy." Do you remember? I hope you saw and heard it. In that message we said God helps us to be holy; but, we must accept His help. Discipline is a painful way of learning. It's painful at the time, but it produces excellent results. A child doesn't ask for a spanking (well, maybe I have seen the time that they seemed to be asking for it, and said well you asked for it, but perhaps they weren't really asking for it). Most of us can remember when our parents corrected us-- and sometimes, it wasn't pleasant. But it's as verse eleven says: "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 by it." Well, the inspired writer of Hebrews said that Jesus Christ is our example: "though He was a Son, yet learned He obedience by the things which He suffered. And having been perfected, He became the author of eternal salvation to all those who obey Him." So then, even Christ learned obedience by suffering. Let us pray. Holy Father, we are so thankful that occasionally You do love us enough that You will rebuke us, chasten us, and let us fall into some painful experience so that we will learn not to repeat such again in our lives. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.
I must add a word of caution to what I have just said. God's purpose in His disciplinary measure is not to tempt a person to do evil, but by facing evil to learn-- and to grow and to develop spiritually. He tells us clearly in James chapter 1, verse 13 that no man should say when he is tempted, "I am tempted of God, for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone."
Paul, the apostle of God called out of due time, wrote the Christians at Rome about why the righteous sometimes suffer. He said, "The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God, and if children, then heirs-- heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us...And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose...Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.” Say, my friend: are you a Christian? Oh! I hope so; but if you are not, I must encourage you before I leave to answer the call to His purpose. Confess Jesus Christ before the world; turn from your sinful lifestyle in repentance; and be baptized into Christ. And that is the way people did it in New Testament days. That is the way to do it today. There are no bargain basement, easy pay plans, friend. Just do it. If you are a Christian but the sufferings were just too much for you and you have fallen by the wayside, I hope you will come home today.
If you would like a free CD or audio cassette tape or a printed copy of this message titled: "God’s Discipline," we would love for you to have it. Just mail your request to In Search of the Lord's Way, P.O. Box 371, Edmond, OK 73083, or by e-mail searchtv@searchtv.com. We are so glad you were with us today. We hope you will be back with us again next Sunday at the same time. We pray God’s blessings upon you that He will keep you in his love, because we love you.
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