Bible Study Stop! It hurts!

[Tenchi]

Hebrews 12:5-13
5 And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons?
“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him.
6 For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.”
7 It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons.
For what son is there whom his father does not discipline?
8 If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated,
then you are illegitimate children and not sons.
9 Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and
we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live?
10 For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them,
but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness.
11 For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but
later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
12 Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees,
13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame
may not be put out of joint but rather be healed.​

I was watching a YouTube video the other day of a dog groomer removing huge mounds of horribly matted fur from a dog. There was so much clumped-up fur all over the dog that I couldn't tell which end of it was which! It had taken many months for the dog to arrive at such a terrible state, it's fur growing a little every day, dirt and debris entangling in it bit-by-bit. For the dog, the process of becoming so badly fouled had been very gradual, the heaviness, and pain, and restriction of its severely matted fur overtaking the creature so slowly and subtly that it had not been alarmed by its deteriorating condition. Incrementally, it had been confined by its perfectly natural growth of fur, the gradual confinement, stench and discomfort of its fur accepted as a normal thing, for the dog.

When the groomer started to remove the large lumps of stinking, dirty fur from the dog, it began to whine, and whimper, and howl, jerking away from the buzzing clipper the groomer was using, even trying to nip at it. The dog wasn't being injured by the clippers; the dog was just unable to understand what was being done to it. The normal condition of the dog, its familiar filthy, matted state, was being changed and by a process utterly strange and mysterious to it. Not surprisingly, the poor creature reacted with fear and defensiveness, trying to protect itself from what it didn't understand - so much so that the groomer finally had to take steps to restrain the animal.

Once the dog was restrained, the groomer began to work in earnest, as rapidly - but gently - as possible, freeing the dog from its own imprisoning fur. With many soothing words and sounds, frequent strokes of his hands, pausing each time the dog whined or howled, the groomer shaved off its furry prison. It seemed to me that the groomer was like a sculptor of stone or wood, gradually carving away great clots of fur until a dog was revealed. As the animal was liberated from its painful burden of fur, it grew calmer and calmer, realizing, it seemed, that something wonderful was happening to it. When, at the last, the groomer began to shave away the overgrown fur from the dog's face, it sat perfectly still, completely at ease, its tail wagging as the curtain of fur covering its eyes fell away and it could see clearly again for the first time in many, many months.

In the video, the dog was shown the next day romping happily in a grassy yard, tossing a chew-toy about and chasing after it, entirely free of the pain and burden of its own fur and loving it.

Perhaps, like me, you can see in this instance of the dog and groomer something of how it sometimes is between us and our Heavenly Father. We can become so bound in sin, in our own natural selfishness and rebellious waywardness, laboring painfully in the shadow of sin, burdened by destructive thinking and habits, that God must step in to "groom" us, shaving away the "matted fur" of our sinfulness in a process of discipline that often has us whining, and howling, and snapping at Him in fear. We haven't noticed, perhaps, that we are becoming increasingly imprisoned and hurt by the sin that comes so readily to us; the damaging consequences of our sin developing so gradually, so incrementally, they cause no alarm in us. But though we may feel little concern about the familiar, filthy, tangled knots of sin that have grown upon us, God knows they will bring us to terrible, even fatal, harm, if left to continue to grow. And so, in love, He acts to liberate us from our "matted fur," no matter the cries of fear and distress we make.

Many times, we are told in God's word to "wait upon the Lord" (Psalm 27:14; Psalm 37:3; Proverbs 20:22; Jeremiah 14:22; Isaiah 40:31, etc.) Like the dog in the video, we must often endure a process of "grooming" through which God frees us from our terrible condition. By this process of transformation, however, He teaches us more about Himself, He demonstrates His astonishing power to us, He forms in us spiritual habits and reflexes, and ultimately He does all these things in order to shape in us the character of Jesus Christ (Romans 8:29; 2 Corinthians 4:7-11; Galatians 5:22-23).

The end result of God's determined, liberating discipline of us is freedom - freedom to be what He intended we should be, unrestrained by the painful burden of sin, leaping about in the "grassy yard" of God's love like the cleaned-up dog, joyful, full of His life, enjoying without hindrance the "peaceable fruit of righteousness."

11 For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but
later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
12 Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees,
13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame
may not be put out of joint but rather be healed.​

 

[Tenchi]

Bump.