God's Discipline Policy

In life, it is easy to drift. A few years ago, Tara Myers and her son Brennan went to the beach and thought it would be fun to take their “swan raft” along for a little ride on the ocean waves off of Ana Maria Island.

Yet, as they were floating on their big inflatable swan having a great time, suddenly they realized that they were drifting off and suddenly she realized that the land was getting farther and farther away.

When she said: “I felt very small, unseen, and almost invisible.” The current took her off shore for miles.

In similar fashion, a 5-year old little girl was playing on her unicorn float and before her parents noticed, she was floating out to sea on the Sea of Corinth. She ended up 1 ½ miles out to sea having a good ole’ time, not noticing that her parents were on shore panicking.

Yet., quickly a ferry boat discovered her and brought her back to shore reuniting her with her parents.

In response, her rescuers said something significant. They said: “Beware of the waves yall.. they often look like they are your friend coming at you to greet you; when in reality, they’re actually pulling you away, drawing you away, drifting away...

Transition:

Hebrews 2:1 says: “Therefore we must give the more earnest heed to the things we have heard, lest we drift away.”

The phrase “drift away” (pararuomen) is a aorist active subjunctive verb means to slip away and drift on by. The idea is of a boat whose anchor has lost its holding, shifts and drifts out and away.”

This is what was happening with the people the Book of Hebrews is written to. It was written to people who whose faith was slipping. Their confidence in God was waning and their trust in God was drifting away.

From this God was at work in their lives. Because He is a Father, he sought to correct them, draw them back, bring them back to Himself and one of the ways He does this is to discipline us.

Transitional Sentence: In Hebrews 12 we get to see God’s discipline policy. What does God say to us about how He disciplines us? God says:

I. My Discipline is Correction; Not Punishment

Vs. 4-6- “You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin, and you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons, MY SON, DO NOT REGARD LIGHTLY THE DISCIPLINE OF THE LORD, NOR FAINT WHEN YOU ARE REPROVED BY HIM; FOR THOSE WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE DISCIPLINES, AND HE SCOURGES EVERY SON WHO HE RECIEVES

Explanation:

Let me ask you. Do you ever wonder if God is punishing you? If you are a Christian and think God is punishing you; then you are completely wrong. God does not punish His children; He disciplines them.

Do you know the difference between correction and punishment?

Punishment is a penalty for the past, and correction is training for the future. Correction is discipline, not punishment.

When something bad happens, we often think God is punishing us when God is actually just correcting us. How can we know this? Because God doesn’t punish his children. Jesus has already taken all of the punishment for every sin on the cross.

Every sin you have ever committed and will ever commit has already been paid for. So God doesn’t punish you for your sins—but he does correct you. His correction is the evidence of his love, because he doesn’t want you to keep going the wrong direction.

One way God corrects us is through pain. Hebrews 12:8-10 says, “If God doesn’t discipline you as he does all of his children, it means that you are illegitimate and are not really his children at all. Since we respected our earthly fathers who disciplined us, shouldn’t we submit even more to the discipline of the Father of our spirits, and live forever? For our earthly fathers disciplined us for a few years, doing the best they knew how. But God’s discipline is always good for us, so that we might share in his holiness” (NLT).

The word “discipline” is an interesting word. It is the marriage of the word “pais” which means “child” and the rest of the word means: “to train or develop.”

To understand this word the best, you need to understand that this word is used to describe two types of people:

a) Children

b) Athletes

The Bible combines these two ideas when it says: “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he grows old (matures) he will not depart from it.”

As a child, our father puts us through many things that help train us up to be prepared for adulthood.