Sermon Tone Analysis

*Secular:*

We all love to challenge God and his motives in our lives… at least every once in awhile…

Listen to the words of Raptevia in this clip from Fiddler on the Roof…

He desires that which God has not promised…

Sometimes we want to avoid the race and claim the prize… It just doesn’t work that way…

Hurdles… trials… are God’s way of growing us through discipline…

Watch…

 

*Biblical:*

Hebrews 12:4 You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin; 5 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; 6 FOR THOSE WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE DISCIPLINES, AND HE SCOURGES EVERY SON WHOM HE RECEIVES."

7 It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom /his /father does not discipline?

8 But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons.

9 Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? 10 For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He /disciplines us /for /our /good, so that we may share His holiness.

11 All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.

Personal:

Not many of us like to be challenged or questioned about how we act or what we do… not many children enjoy the discipline their parents enact in their lives…

~*~* Steve?

No many people like to be disciplined…

(I love the line when someone gets a ticket for speeding… why don’t they go after the real criminals…)

 

We pretty much dislike being disciplined…

 

Bridge:

Scripture teaches that discipline is much more than we often perceive… especially when it comes from God…

God protects us… God grows us… God teaches us through discipline…

Discipline is administered by God because He loves us… more than we can understand…

Most children will tell you they don’t get it… when they are disciplined…

God explains to us…

We need to view discipline as another aspect of God grace, mercy and immeasurable love for his children…

 

Let’s look at it…

 

Body:

*Purposes of Discipline*/(3 types)/

            *Punishment *

* Look at King David… “A man after God’s own heart”

* Adultery and murder

* God punishes David…

* Anguish over the loss of his son

* Heartaches from his other sons…

* Years of anguish… for this “man after God’s own heart”

 

*Prevention*

* Restrictions on our lives…

* Boundaries… like we do with our own children…

* Don’t run across the road

* Don’t talk to strangers

* The Don’t list…

* 2 Cor 12:7… It talk of Paul having a “thorn in the flesh”… he pleads three times with God to remove it…

* 2 Corinthians 12:7 Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me-- to keep me from exalting myself!

8 Concerning this I implored the Lord three times that it might leave me. 9 And He has said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness."

Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.

* It was not out a malice or vindictiveness that Paul had to deal with the thorn I the flesh… it was to protect him from pride…

* Prevention… curfews… monitored behaviour…

 

*Education*

* Do you know the story of Job…

* The Bible says God was “blameless before God”

* …yet God turned him over to be tested… not because Job wasn’t on God’s bad guy radar screen… quiet the opposite… God want to teach Job… grow Job… educate Job…

* Job 42:5… 5 "I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear; But now my eye sees You”

* Realized who God was and is…

* Job lived righteously without fully understanding… through discipline he came to know God more fully…

 

 

Why are people being Disciplined according to this text…

3 Points…

*Forgetting God’s Word*

v. 5 – “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;”

* Have you known someone to say…

* I am waiting for the Lord to tell me whether I should…

* You fill in the blank…

* Serve in a ministry

* Take a certain job

* Marry a certain person

* None of these things are things we need to rush into…

* Prayer…

* Quiet time before God…

* But sometime we are looking for a “New Light”… from God…

* When we have been given his Word…

* Sometimes the answers we need or the help we desire was given to us a longtime ago… bit we too have forgotten!!

* Two problems with Forgetting God’s Word…

1) We regard the discipline of the Lord lightly

2) We ‘faint’ when we are reproved…

·         1) We regard the discipline of the Lord lightly

o       Not that we take our problems too lightly… our spiritual weakness is that we can’t or won’t often see what God is teaching us… (Forget the Word and it all makes no sense!!)

o       Rom 8: 28 And we know that God causes *all* *things* to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to /His /purpose.

o       O Woes me… o why me… need to be changed… to what are you teaching me… in the light of your Word in the knowledge of your truth… open my eyes Lord…

o       Don’t regard the discipline to lightly… (how many times have I told you…?)

·         2) We ‘faint’ when we are reproved…

o       We are wimps sometimes…

o       Long before we have learned the lesson… we begin to blame God… be angry… fail to see the big picture…

o       (Forget the Word and we have no strength!!)

o       Psa 42: 11 Why are you in despair, O my soul?

And why have you become disturbed within me?

Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him, The help of my countenance and my God.

o       Do not faint or hide or run in trial… but find hope… in God…

o       He is our strength… our shield… our refuge…

o       We want to be strong… we need to know his Word… his Promises… his Hope

We need to remember the Word of God…

Hold fast…

That we might learn in our trials…

And That we make be strong…

*Never Forgetting God’s Word*

 

 

*Proofs in Discipline*

6 FOR THOSE WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE DISCIPLINES, AND HE SCOURGES EVERY SON WHOM HE RECEIVES."

7 It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom /his /father does not discipline?

8 But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons.

* For those whom the Lord loves he disciplines…

* Outstanding isn’t it…