GOD-DISCIPLINE

The author of Hebrews readily admits that discipline is painful (Heb. 10:11). But He also assures us it is profitable. It produces “a harvest of righteousness and peace.” The purpose of God’s discipline is not to punish us but to transform us. He has already meted out punishment for our sins on Jesus at Calvary: “The punishment that brought us peace was upon Him” (Isaiah 53:5). But we must be transformed more and more into the likeness of Christ. That is the purpose of discipline.

Jerry Bridges

This is not to say that every adversity that occurs in our lives through God’s discipline is related to some specific sin we have committed. The issue God is dealing with in our lives is not so much what we do, but what we are. All of us tend to underestimate the remaining sinfulness in our hearts. We fail to see the extent of pride, fleshly self-confidence, selfish ambitions, stubbornness, self-justification, lack of love, and distrust of God that He does see.

Jerry Bridges

God does deal with our sins, but only in such a way as for our good. He does not deal with us as our sins deserve, which would be punishment, but as His grace provides, which is for our good.

Jerry Bridges

Discipline may be either corrective or remedial. It may be sent for the purpose of correcting some sinful attitude or action, or to remedy some lack in our character. In either case, it is administered by our heavenly Father in love, not in wrath. Jesus has already borne the wrath of God in our place, so all adversities that come to us, come because He loves us and designs to conform us to the likeness of His Son.

Jerry Bridges

Even when God deems it necessary to discipline us for persistent disobedience, He always does so out of love to restore us to the way of obedience (see Hebrews 12:4-11).

Jerry Bridges

If we only knew how bad we are, we would welcome chastening because this is God’s way of getting rid of sin and its habits. But chastening is resented because we cannot believe that we have done anything worthy of it.

John Sanderson

The Fruit of the Spirit, Zondervan, 1972, p. 71.

We often learn more of God under the rod that strikes us than under the staff that comforts us.

Stephen Charnock

God never punishes his children in the sense of avenging justice. He chastens as a father does his child, but he never punishes his redeemed as a judge does a criminal. It is unjust to exact punishment from redeemed souls since Christ has been punished in their place. How shall the Lord punish twice for one offense?

C.H. Spurgeon

No matter how dear you are to God, if pride is harbored in your spirit, He will whip it out of you. They that go up in their own estimation must come down again by His discipline.

C.H. Spurgeon

God’s people can never by any possibility be punished for their sins. God has punished them already in the person of Christ, their substitute. But yet, while the Christian cannot be condemned, he can be chastised. Punishment is laid on a man in anger; God strikes him in wrath. But when he afflicts His child, chastisement is applied in love. The rod has been baptized in deep affection before it is laid on the believer’s back.

C.H. Spurgeon

Sermons, 1.363.

It is self-evident that if punishment is not painful, it is not punishment. The only point of punishment is the administration of pain. The person who does sin…deserves to be punished; he deserves to suffer. One hopes that suffering will cure him of his sinfulness. At least, it will correct his behavior. He will be “scared straight” in behavior, if not softened in spirit.

John Gerstner

The Problem of Pleasure, Soli Deo Gloria, 2002, p. 8-9.

The godly do suffer and complain about it at times. But the Bible teaches plainly that their suffering, even after their conversion and reconciliation to God, is not punishment any longer, but chastening. It is not the punishment of a God who is angry with them, but the chastening of a God who is reconciled to them. Whom God loves, the Scriptures says, He chastens. He makes all things, including pain, “work together for good for them that love God, and are called according to His purpose.” That should be the consolation and strength of the saints… That affliction is actually a blessing in disguise. At other times, the pain hurts so much that they cannot, through the tears, see the disguise. Momentarily they lament the heavy hand of God upon them, but when they are thinking in their most saintly character, they praise God. His rod and staff comfort them.

John Gerstner

The Problem of Pleasure, Soli Deo Gloria, 2002, p. 11-12.

When pain is present it is difficult to bear; but when a Christian, even in anguish, realizes that this is the heavy hand of a loving God upon him, he blesses God in his sufferings and for His suffering, which he knows is for his own good and for his everlasting blessedness.

John Gerstner

The Problem of Pleasure, Soli Deo Gloria, 2002, p. 12.

Love precedes discipline.

John Owen

Quoted in: The Father’s Discipline, Tabletalk, Oct. 2004, p. 45, Used by Permission.

God's wounds cure, sin’s kisses kill.

William Gurnall

God’s corrections are instructions, His lashes our lessons, His scourges our schoolmasters, His chastisements our admonitions! And to note this, the Hebrews and Greeks both do express chastening and teaching by one and the same word, because the latter is the true end of the former.

Thomas Brooks

A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 16.

The godly have some good in them, therefore the devil afflicts them; and some evil in them, therefore God afflicts them.

Thomas Watson

“Is discipline the same as punishment?” a young woman asked me. She was troubled by the idea of God wanting to “get even.” I gave her 1 Corinthians 11:32 (NEB) “When…we do fall under the Lord’s judgment, He is disciplining us, to save us from being condemned with the rest of the world.” God’s “punishment” of His children is never retribution, but rather correction. We know that we are indeed His beloved sons, sharing in the discipline that all sons share – for a high purpose, namely that we may some day share in His holiness, “attain life.”

Elisabeth Elliot

Discipline – The Glad Surrender, Revell, 1982, p. 153.

Chastisement is designed for our good, to promote our highest interests. Look beyond the rod to the All-wise hand that wields it!

A.W. Pink

Look upon your chastening as God’s chariots sent to carry your soul into the high places of spiritual achievement.

Hannah Whitall Smith

[God] is not at a loss when He moves to bring us back to Himself. He can woo or whip. He can draw or drive. He can work rapidly or slowly, as He pleases. In other words, He is free to be God! And in His own way, at His own pace, He brings us back.

Tom Wells

Christian: Take Heart! By Permission of the Banner of Truth Trust, Carlisle, PA. 1987, p. 61.

It hurts when God has to PRY things out of our hand!

Corrie Ten Boom

The chastisements of Christ are precious to those who believe. The believer’s love to Jesus Christ, not only continues under the rod of correction – but is quickened and increased by it! Thus it is distinguished from that pretended love, which exists only in times of prosperity. The afflicted Christian is enabled to consider – that whom the Lord loves – He chastens, and scourges every son whom He receives; and that He only afflicts us for our profit – to make us partakers of His holiness.

John Fawcett
Christ Precious

God has no pleasure in afflicting us, but He will not keep back even the most painful chastisement if He can but thereby guide His beloved child to come home and abide in the beloved Son.

Andrew Murray

It is in mercy and in measure that God chastiseth His children.

John Trapp

A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 41.

We may feel God’s hand as a Father upon us when He strikes us as well as when He strokes us.

Abraham Wright

A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 41.

He remembers our frame and knows that we are dust. He may sometimes chasten us, it is true, but even this He does with a smile, the proud, tender smile of a Father who is bursting with pleasure over an imperfect but promising son who is coming every day to look more and more like the One whose child he is.

A.W. Tozer

Whenever God reproves us, not only in words, but in reality, and reminds us of our sins, we do not so suffer for one fault as to be free for the future, but that until we from the heart repent, He ever sounds in our ears these words, Still God will contend with you: and a real contention is meant.

John Calvin
Commentary, Jeremiah 2:9.

We may think that…severity (as God leads His children) is inconsistent with what we know of God’s gentleness and compassion. But that is because we do not appreciate how seriously God loves us, and how determined He is that we should have His best, even if it means pain.

Sinclair Ferguson

A Heart for God, 1987, p. 100, by permission Banner of Truth, Carlisle, PA.

God does not afflict His children willingly. He takes no delight in seeing our tears – or hearing our groans. But He does take delight in doing us good, making us holy, conforming us to His own image, and fitting us to dwell in His own presence.

John Angell James

The Widow Directed to the Widow's God, 1841.

Many people fail to make a clear distinction between punishment and discipline, and there is a very significant difference between these two concepts. Punishment is designed to execute retribution for a wrong done. Discipline, on the other hand, is to encourage the restoration of the one involved in the wrongdoing. Punishment is designed primarily to avenge a wrong and assert justice. Discipline is designed primarily as a corrective for the one who has failed to live according to the standards of the church and/or society.

Carl Laney

A Guide to Church Discipline, Bethany, 1985, p. 79.