Enduring Hardship

Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as His children.  ...  No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful.  Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. - Hebrews 12:7,11

I was teary-eyed yesterday listening to a radio broadcast by Focus on the Family of parents who have had incredible hardships through their children's physical health or even death.  One mother was testifying how she had come to know God through that hardship and even with the pain of the loss of her daughter, she felt so very blessed that she had been in her life and that the experience had led her to the saving knowledge of Jesus.  I found her story compelling and telling of how to live out this concept.  The broadcast link is HERE.

"Endure hardship as discipline."  I find this easy to grasp sometimes, but extremely difficult at others.  I have to consider Jesus' answer to the disciples in John 9:2-3, "His disciples asked him, 'Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?  'Neither this man nor his parents sinned,' said Jesus, 'but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.'"  Discipline by definition is a "practice of training people to a code of behavior" and "a branch of knowledge".  It is plausible then to consider that discipline is a training inside of us for a behavior and knowledge.  Applying what we know from a previous blog entry (see More Than Conquerors) that the good that is being worked inside of us is the revelation and perfection of God's character in us, then we can see how we might can endure hardship, or any other event in our life, as discipline (behavior training and knowledge of God).

This discipline produces "a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it".  Obviously, we have the option to not be trained and to just hope we survive.  But, as a parent this is the absolute worst option I would ever want for my kids, to endure a discipline and receive absolutely no benefit.  It is a wasted event and one that will likely have to be repeated.  The faster they pick up the purpose to the discipline the faster I react to their learning.  Although, sometimes I wonder if God allows things to happen in our life so that learned character will show or shine for others to see Him in us.  Even so, there is always more work in us that can be done.  We are always able to get "closer still" to Him.