The Struggle
“Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted. In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. 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.
For the Lord disciplines the one he loves,
and chastises every son whom he receives.’” (Hebrews 12:3-6 ESV)
When Jesus Christ died on that cross, taking upon himself the sins of the entire world, he put our sins to death with him in order that, by faith in him, we will die with him to sin and live to him and to his righteousness in walks of obedience to his commands. For Jesus Christ died on that cross to deliver us out of our slavery to sin so what we will obey his commands and live for him, and not just to forgive us our sins, and not so that we can go on living in sin now guilt free. (Romans 6:1-23; Titus 2:11-14; Luke 9:23-26)
We are, thus, as followers of Jesus Christ, to throw off those weights of sin so that we can run with endurance the Christian race that God has set before us, keeping our eyes on Jesus and not on the flesh (Hebrews 12:1-2). And we must resist the devil and flee temptation to sin. And we must accept the Lord’s discipline in our lives and his chastisements of us as that of a loving parent who wants to keep us from doing evil and to train us to do what is good and righteous and godly and morally pure and upright.
For Discipline
“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? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. 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? 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. 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. (Hebrews 12:7-11 ESV)
In what ways does our Lord discipline us so that we share in his holiness? He corrects us when we are going the wrong way. And he may allow sickness or injury or rejection or mistreatment to come into our lives to humble us and to discipline us in the ways of the Lord so that we follow in his pathways, and so that we do not stray from him and go our own way, instead. And just because we are disciplined, it doesn’t mean we have necessarily done something wrong, for discipline is also training in righteousness.
But those lacking in this discipline continue on in their sins because they are resistant to such discipline and will not accept it in their lives. For they are still lord over their own lives, charting their own course, living according to their own sinful and selfish desires. And so they leave a trail of sin behind them rather than a trail of self-discipline and walks of holiness and righteousness and obedience to our Lord, in practice. For they live for self and for the flesh and not for the glory of God, doing what pleases him.
So, for the ones who are disciplined by the Lord, and who accept that discipline, and who grow to maturity in Christ because of it, they share in Christ’s holiness and yield the peaceful fruit of righteousness, because they have been trained by such disciplines in godliness and in holy living. But the ones who reject the disciplines of the Lord and choose to go their own way, instead, end up continuing on a path of sin and thus are regarded by God as illegitimate children of God, giving lip service, but not in action and truth.
Lift Your Drooping Hands
“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.” (Hebrews 12:12-13 ESV)
Drooping hands are those which are limp, slumped, sinking, slouching, or lounging (idling, lazing, loafing). And hands are what we do to do work, so they represent our deeds (works). So if someone has drooping hands, this is someone who is being slothful, lazy, and idle, who is not living under the disciplines of the Lord but who is living for self and for self-pleasure. And it could be that they find the disciplines of God too painful, so they give up. It is just easier for them to yield to sin than to resist it and flee it.
When I think of knees I think of prayer but also of bowing the knee to the Lord in humble submission and in obedience to him and to his commands. So if our knees are weak, then our submission to God and to his will and purposes for our lives is also weak (limp, shaky, flimsy, insubstantial). We are not those who are living in surrender of our lives to the will of God, but we are those who live by our emotions and what makes us feel good, because that is easier than enduring the disciplines of the Lord Jesus.
So, if that is where we are, the counsel for us then is to stop being lazy and slothful and to stop resisting the Lord and his disciplines in our lives, and to now obey the Lord and his commands, in practice, and to walk in holiness and righteousness and in godly living in the power of God, doing the will of God. And we are to now surrender our lives to the Lord and to submit to his will for our lives and to do what he says we are to do as his followers. And we are now to live holy lives pleasing to our Lord.
Teach Them
An Original Work / May 24, 2012
Based off various scriptures
Open up the blinded eyes of
Those who walk in sin’s darkness.
Turn them to the light of Christ
And to His righteousness.
Turn them from the pow’r of Satan.
Turn them to the peace of Christ,
So they may receive forgiveness
And eternal life.
Teach them to put off their old selves
And their former way of life,
And to put on their new self,
Reborn to be like Christ;
To not copy worldly customs;
Be transformed in life and mind;
Obey freely His word in them,
Pleasing unto God.
Teach them how to love their neighbors
Truly as they love themselves;
Be a witness; share the gospel;
Satan’s lies dispel;
Comfort all who mourn in sadness;
Share Christ’s love and joy today.
Do this through your life and witness
For your Lord always.
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