The Father’s Discipline (Part 2 of 2)

We don't like to think about discipline.

Nobody likes to talk about it. And experiencing discipline is usually even worse. So why does God discipline us as his children? Today on Truth for Life, Alistair Begg outlines the purpose and the product of the father's discipline. We continue in Hebrews 12 verse 5. I want to say three things about discipline. Actually, I don't. I want to show you three things that the writer says about discipline.

And they're very simple. Number one, the privilege of discipline. The privilege of discipline.

Endure hardship as discipline. God is treating you as sons. It is a sign of our sonship. Discipline your son, he'll bring you peace. He will delight your soul.

Fail to, he'll bring you anguish and agony. Somewhere in here, I have a quote from the newspaper. It was a letter by a father to his son.

It went like this, "'Dear son, as long as you live under this roof, you will follow the rules. In our house we do not have a democracy. I did not campaign to be your father.

You did not vote for me. We are father and son by the grace of God. I consider it a privilege, and I accept the responsibility. In accepting it, I have an obligation to perform the role of a father. I am not your pal. The age difference makes such a relationship impossible. We can share many things, but you must remember that I am your father.

This is a hundred times more meaningful than being a pal. You will do as I say as long as you live in this house. You're not to disobey me, because whatever I ask you to do is motivated by love. This may be hard for you to understand at times, but the rule holds. You will understand perfectly when you have a son of your own.

Until then, trust me. Love, Dad.'" Now, in contrast to that, the Houston Police Department put out a memo some time ago indicating to people, on the basis of what they've been seeing in domestic disputes, how to ruin your children. This is the memo. How to ruin your children and they guarantee it to be ninety-nine percent effective.

Number one. Begin with infancy to give the child everything he wants. When he picks up bad words, laugh at him. Never give him any spiritual training. Let him wait until he's twenty-one, and then let him decide for himself. Avoid using the word wrong. It may develop a serious guilt complex.

Pick up everything he leaves lying around so he will be experienced in throwing responsibility on everybody else. You turn to the pages of Scripture, and it is there right before our gaze. He says, "'We all had human fathers who disciplined us. If we did, we should arise and call them blessed. And we respected them for it, and so we ought. How much more, then,' he said, if that is the case on an earthly basis, should we then submit to the Father of our spirits and live? If through our earthly pilgrimage we granted honor and respect to those who were our physical parents, how much more, then, should we bow and give that same honor and obedience and respect to our Father who is the author not only of our physical lives but also of our spiritual lives? Indeed, we should pity, then, the child whose father has assumed that love demands that he allow his son to do what he likes, have what he wants, and to come and go as he pleases.' And I want you to know that this is a challenge for me."

That's why I said I wrote this for myself. Immediate gratification says, "'I'll let it go. I'll get it. I'll leave. Oh, who cares?

Oh, I'll see you later.'" The immediate gratification—'cause it gets it all out of your hair. You don't have to deal with it. Within thirty seconds, it's gone.

The offending article has escaped. Delayed gratification—the gratification of wisdom and maturity and progress—demands that we have to go through the same jolly conversation a hundred and fifty million times. No, you can't have it. No, you can't do it.

No, you can't stay over. The Puritan said, "'As God corrects none but his own, so all that are his shall be sure to have correction, and they shall regard it as a favor.'" But that's the privilege of discipline.

It's a sign of belonging. All the kids playing in the backyard, when you come home, you could stop the car, buy ice cream cones, and give them to all of them. There were thirty of them there. You can give it to them all. You can invite them to a picnic. You can provide them with a party.

You can do everything else. But only those who are your own children may you intervene in their lives and exercise discipline and jurisdiction over them. And the one thing that distinguishes them from the rest of the group, when Dad shows up—especially where the behavior is less than desirable—will be the fact of our exercise, of our parental jurisdiction.

Well, I spend longer on that than I should. But that's the privilege of discipline. Notice how we're told the purpose of discipline. The purpose of discipline.

Verse 10, Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best, but God disciplines us, notice, for our good that we may share in his holiness. Why is this happening? Well, it's happening for our good.

Doesn't seem like good. I know that, but it is. How do you know that? Because God's Word said so. In order that we might become holy. I don't know if I want to become holy. Believe me, you do.

Holy sounds like mothballs. I know it does. But holy's good. Are you sure it's good? Yes, it's good. I don't think it's good. I think this is good.

The pleasures of sin for a season. I think being here's good. I think being with her's good.

I think doing that's good. But I don't think this is good. And I don't think this is exactly what it says.

Honey, this is exactly what it says, and this is what it means. He disciplined us. Now, the interesting thing is—and it's pointed out here, and notice that in passing—our fathers disciplined us, notice, for a little while. For a wee while. How quickly our children pass through our hands.

How quickly, in a moment, they're gone. You've been there. You've got your grandchildren coming home.

You say, How did this happen? And you meet young couples at the mall, and you say, Now enjoy all the days, and enjoy all the stages. And the young couple are going, tearing their hair out, saying, Enjoy all the stages. Hey, why don't you take this stage? You think, Maybe you've forgotten this stage.

Try it for a while. But we know. You know. There is enjoyment in all of that.

And it only lasts for a little while. And the discipline that we exercise is as we think best. Our parents disciplined, our fathers disciplined us, for a wee while.

Eventually we were gone, beyond their jurisdiction, and while we were there, they did it as they thought best. In other words, listen very, very carefully. Parental discipline is never perfect. And I'll be strutting your stuff around, going, Well, I know about parental discipline. Be very careful. You may just stand on the end of a rake. It'll make a permanent mark right on your nose. The people that know about parental discipline know they don't know about parental discipline.

We know the principles, but the application's hard. Because our motives in disciplining aren't always best. If I go back to the grocery store just for a moment, here comes Mrs. X with the kid in the chariot. The kid is being a royal pain in the teeth for five rows. Oh, come on now, Charlie! Come on!

Come on, Charlie! And around we go. Then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, she takes a cornflake box and whacks it right on the back of the head. And the child's saying to himself, How did the corn…? Where did the cornflake box come from?

How did that happen? And then he looks beyond his mother, and he sees Mrs. Y coming round the corner. And see, Mrs. Y is in Mrs. X's Bible study.

And Mrs. X is doing the parenting trip, you know? So she knows about parenting. But she's had five rows of sheer aggravation, and now she decides to discipline.

Why? Because she's motivated by pride. She doesn't want Mrs. Y to see that she's making a hash of it.

She doesn't want to see this terror that she has in the chariot. And dads do the exact same thing. Also, our timing in disciplining is often horrendous. And our methods are often flawed. And we serve nothing to our children by seeking to suggest to them that the privilege of discipline and the necessary protections which discipline provides are also coexistent with our perfect ability to apply those principles. So we have to be honest enough to say, you know, it was right and necessary for you to be disciplined. I'm sorry that I did it at the time that I did. I'm sorry that I did it in the way that I did. And I'm sorry that the motives of my heart had more to do with me preserving my own image and ego than they had to see you becoming the kind of child that I know you need to become. And it is often a failure to do that on the part of fathers in particular that creates the dreadful autocratic role that is so unhelpful and so inimical of the pattern of God in relationship to discipline.

Now, the contrast is so obvious. Our fathers disciplined us for a wee while. They thought it best. God disciplines us for our good that we may share in our holiness. In other words, the exercise of discipline that God, our Father, exercises is unerring in its wisdom. It's not a hit-and-miss kind of thing. It's directed to this one end for our good. We tend to think we know what is for our good, the same way that our children do. They think they know what's for their good regarding bedtime, regarding diet, regarding purchases, regarding friends.

They think they've got that all down. And they need to learn that Father, in the best of cases, knows best, and it is certainly true here in relationship to God our Father. And what the writer says to these dear, struggling believers, and to us this morning, is simply this. Our heavenly Father orders these events.

He's working them together for our good and in order that we might become like his Son. That's really what it means that we may share in his holiness. It doesn't mean we become stiff and starchy, for God is not that. It means that we are set apart to God and set apart for God, that there will be the attractiveness of the gospel, the attractiveness of peace in a world of disquiet, the attractiveness of joy in a world of gloom, the attractiveness of assurance in a world of uncertainty. And God uses these factors in our lives to fashion us to that end. Says Jim Packer, the Bible does not allow us to suppose that because God is love, we may look to him to confer happiness on people who will not seek holiness. Now look at the last point there in verse 11. The privilege of discipline, the purpose of discipline, and the product of discipline.

No discipline seems pleasant at the time but painful. Thank you for such an honest and realistic sentence, we find ourselves saying. The writer in no way minimizes the experiences through which we go. There are things that if we could rewrite the chapters, we would take them out in an instant.

If we could delete it from the computer experience of our lives, we would press the delete key and go back for quite a long way. But the fact of the matter is that it is there. Now he says, I don't want you focusing just on the red marks, on the bruises, the bumps, the tears, and the anguish.

I want you to hold on and realize this—that how it hurts in the present is subservient to what it holds for the future. Because, he says, later on it'll produce a harvest of righteousness and of peace. It's hard to believe that when you plant stuff, isn't it? You plant stuff, you dig a hole, you put it in the ground, you cover it up, and there's nothing there. You come back the next day, there's nothing there. The next day, there's nothing there. Nothing, nothing, nothing. You say, goodness gracious, I went down the road, spent all that money, dug a hole, put it in the ground, and nothing.

What do you have to be? Patient. You can't be a farmer without being patient.

And he says, listen, this is no funny, little, slick, methodological Christianity, where these three things are the key to your existence, and if you do this and do this and do this, you'll be this. I mean, that's the whole myth of physical fitness, isn't it? I mean, every jolly magazine in creation has got something on it about how you can have a stomach that looks like Schwarzenegger and shoulders that look like whoever it is, and you can do this in twenty minutes. Do you believe that? Well, then how come you look like you look? Honestly! I mean, you can't hold up the front of Men's Health magazine in front of the mirror in your hotel room and yourself and do anything except just burst into tears.

And the possibility of getting like that sometime in the next millennium is so outlandish. Because we want to say, could I be like that tomorrow? Not a cotton-picking chance. Can I be a mature, steady, following Christian tomorrow?

No! But maybe the day after tomorrow or the day after tomorrow's tomorrow. Because eventually, he says—and here's the promise—you will produce a harvest of inner peace and moral uprightness, providing you have been trained by it. Now, let me hit that phrase, and we're through. Trained by it. In other words, the experience, the harvest, is not reaped by people who simply experience it. It is reaped by those who are trained by it. Because, you see, in the expression of discipline, our kids aren't always trained by discipline. We can discipline our kids, and they're not trained by it.

Have you noticed that? You discipline your children, and they reply in a spirit of defeated resignation. They sort of give themselves up to it. Oh, well, go ahead, do what you have to do. Fine, I'll stay home.

I'll go in the basement. I don't care. There's no training in that. Nor when they reply in a spirit of hardhearted defiance. Go ahead. It won't hurt me.

It won't change anything. There's no training in that. In a spirit of self-pity. I'm the only person this happens to. No one else gets this in my school.

I never have—none of my friends have this. Look at me, I'm the worst—look at that, I'm the worst person in the world. Ah, shut up. That doesn't train anybody. Nor are they trained when they respond in a spirit of resentment. What have I done to deserve this?

Who do you think you are? You're not allowed to do this stuff. They told us at school you're not allowed to do this stuff. There's no training in that. The only time that discipline produces training is when the person is trained by it. What does it mean to be trained by it?

It means to submit to it in a spirit of endurance which recognizes that the source of it is the hand of a loving father, not the hand of a cruel tyrant. And all that stuff that you used to read before you had kids, and I used to read it and smile, you read these things, and when you discipline your children, you should tell them that this hurts you more than it hurts them. I said, Oh golly, my dad wrote a book now.

Where did we get this stuff from? Hurts the father more than hurts the kid. Then you have a child.

It does. I've wept more over my kids than I wept over my own sins. Here's the deal, loved ones. To think of God as a loving, heavenly Father is to think correctly. To think that his love is a kind of love which is soft and Santa Claus-ish is to think unbiblically.

But rather, he loves us with the same kind of compassionate care that the best of earthly fathers will show to the children that are under their jurisdiction. And the key thing is, are we going to attend the training, or are we going to be trained? Sometimes I would cheat at training for soccer in Scotland. I'd come home congratulating myself. Well, I was there, but I didn't really do it. I thought I was a smart guy. We trained three nights a week till Saturday came. And then on Saturday, when I was five yards short and running for a ball in the middle of the field, then I wasn't such a smart chap after all, because I shortchanged myself.

I attended the event, but I did not get under the burden of the experience. The harvest of righteousness is in those who've been trained by it. This is one of my little notes and quotes, and with this I close. One of my good friends, twenty-plus years ago, had married a girl called Maria. I've mentioned her before. She was strikingly beautiful.

And I always looked at him and said, Man, you know, how did you manage that? In the same way that people look at Sue and look at me and… And they hadn't been married a year, and she was diagnosed with cancer. And the cancer just ravished her.

And I watched them both. And this is her last entry in her diary. It reads like this, God, I don't understand, but I love you, and I trust you. Don't let me let you down in this battle. Help me, Lord, to be what you want me to be in this, to learn what you want me to learn in this. Not to waste this experience, but to show the reality of knowing you. And because she was prepared to endure the discipline in that way, all these years after going to heaven, by my telling you, Hebrews 12 is fulfilled.

She is reaping a harvest. Of righteousness and peace, along with others, who we'll be trained to. A humbling story that encourages us to endure God's loving discipline.

This is Truth for Life with Alistair Begg. In just a minute, Alistair will close our program with prayer, so please keep listening. The topic of discipline is not an easy one, but here at Truth for Life, we are committed to teaching the whole Bible, even the hard parts. God uses the teaching of his word to convert unbelievers, to establish those who are believers, and then to strengthen local churches. That phrase may sound familiar.

You've likely heard me mention these three outcomes before. That's because God causes these things to happen as we carry out our mission, which is to teach the Bible with clarity and relevance. It's a mission we are passionate about, one that we'd love for you to be a part of. You can do that easily by becoming one of our monthly Truth Partners. Truth Partners are listeners just like you, who pray for Truth for Life and who give a monthly donation to help cover the cost of producing and distributing these daily messages. When you become a Truth Partner today, or when you make a one-time donation, we'd like to say thanks by sending you a book that supplements our study in the book of Hebrews. The book is called God Does His Best Work with Empty. Each chapter in this book explores various passages in the Bible to show how God uses suffering, disappointment, and even loss to draw us close to himself. As we've been learning, things like discipline and suffering can feel like punishment, but Alistair has been helping us understand that God uses these things for our good and for his glory. The stories that are explored in the book God Does His Best Work with Empty assure us that God does not abandon us in times of trouble.

In fact, he desires just the opposite. As you read this book, you'll find out how he fills us with his provision, how he even gives us peace and joy in the midst of our struggles. Request your copy of the book God Does His Best Work with Empty when you sign up to become a monthly Truth Partner or when you make a one-time donation. You can visit us online at truthforlife.org slash donate or you can call us at 888-588-7884. If you'd rather mail your donation along with your request for the book, write to Truth for Life at P.O.

Box 398000, Cleveland, Ohio 44139. Now let's join Alistair as he closes with prayer. O God our Father, we thank you that you are our Father in heaven, and we love you this morning, and we thank you for loving us. In fact, if you hadn't loved us, we wouldn't know how to love you in response. We bless you for your Word. We thank you that it cuts to the very heart of our lives. It touches where we live. It's an old book, but it's a vital and up-to-date story.

Its themes are practical, life-changing. Some of us, Lord, have been making a hash of it as dads, and we confess that and ask for your help. Others of us have occasion to go and thank our earthly fathers and to bless them for their provision. And all of us have reason to look up to you, our Father in heaven, and thank you for ordering our steps. And now we commit one another into your care. May your grace and mercy and peace from Father, Son, and Holy Spirit be the abiding portion of all who believe, today and forevermore. Amen. I'm Bob Lapeen. Tomorrow we'll find out what it takes to remain faithful until the end in the Christian race. I hope you can join us. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.