The Discipline of God is for our own good…

Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. (Hebrews 12:10 NIV)

It is not based on hatred…

Yes, it is based on hatred towards our old selves…

Towards our flesh…

God hates wickedness…

Our flesh is completely wicked…

(Having said that, “but God demonstrates His own Love to us in this, while we were still sinners Christ died for us” – Amazing Love – so at the same time He both hates and loves those who do not yet know Him through different sides of His Character…)

Those who are in the flesh cannot please God…

But God does not hate our new selves…

Our new selves are completely pure and cannot sin…

So we see we have a contradiction working within us…

“Sin within us” or our flesh or our old self is incapable of doing anything righteous and our new self is incapable of doing anything sinful…

“Behold the Kindness and the Severity of God”…

We are the recipients of God’s Kindness towards our new selves…

We are the recipients of God’s Severity towards our old selves…

“For you died and your life is now hidden with Christ in God”…

The joy is that we (the old self) died and our (new self’s) life is now hidden with Christ in God…

So when we experience the Lord’s Judgement against “sin within me” it is not towards us…

It is towards what used to be us before we were saved…

I am no longer my old self…

I am my new self…

So I welcome the Judgement of God into my life – focused on my old self – because I know that there is no Judgement of God focused on my new self and any Judgement of God which I am experiencing focused on my old self is “all good” cos it’s getting rid of “the body of this death”…

The ancient’s (Romans) used to attach a dead body onto the back of someone on “death row” and have them wander through the streets before their impending death so that everyone could see that they were “goners”…

Christ has done the same with us… 🙂

We (our new selves) wander through life with a decaying corpse (the body of this death) strapped to our back but the good thing is that this decaying corpse is decaying – literally falling off us and our new self is being renewed day by day…

So our new self which starts off life like a new born baby gets stronger and stronger and stronger and the decaying corpse gets lighter and lighter and lighter as we grow in the Lord…

Heading towards being with Him forever in heaven…

We have the daily reminder of what we were and are humbled to see what we are becoming…

We are growing in Grace and in the Knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ…

So we gladly rejoice in the Fire of God being applied to our flesh as we know that it will burn it away…

Whatever is gold, silver or precious stones will be enhanced by the Fire and whatever is wood, hay and stubble will be burnt away…

We welcome this now as we know that we will have less to be ashamed at before Him when we face Him on that day if all these things are being dealt with now…

He has already forgiven us…

He is coming to bring us a salvation “without reference to sin” when He returns…

Knowing that we’ll never experience His Wrath for our sin and knowing that He has fully forgiven us and that all we will hear from His Mouth is “Well done, good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of our rest” is enough to melt any of us to think “I don’t want to meet Him with this “remainder” of sin in my life – I want to be pure for Him, He has given me so much” (not that we can strive to try and achieve this – everything needs to be in His timing)…

Not because we have to – He has already pronounced us holy – but because we want to…

yet He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach– (Colossians 1:22 NASB)

We do not want to shrink away from Him at His coming…

Now, little children, abide in Him, so that when He appears, we may have confidence and not shrink away from Him in shame at His coming. (1 John 2:28 NASB)

And we won’t cos we know that it is He Himself who is at work in us to take the remainder of “sin within us” away and we know as we’re in that “surrendered place” where we are just letting Him “have at it” that any of the remains at His coming will be burnt up when we see Him face to Face – His Eyes are a blazing Fire…

It’s better that we’re Judged now rather than experiencing that pain when we see Him face to Face (we know that His Heart will beam with joy to see us but we also know that His Eyes blaze with Fire – I am not afraid – Praise You Jesus – I am not afraid – Hallelujah – Thank You Jesus – Thank You Jesus for delivering me)…

We know that whatever shape we see Him in it will be a last Fire which we will pass through to enter into His Glory…

I suppose what I’m saying and what I’m seeing is that I want this in my life so when it comes time to enter into His Glory I will not have anything left to be ashamed of (but I also see that wherever I get to in this process is in His Grace – I am covered in His Grace and I am content – pressing on but content – there’s a tension in me – a holy tension – accepted but pressing on)…

This has nothing to do with forgiveness…

This has nothing to do with relationship on God’s side…

This has everything to do with relationship on our side that we don’t want to be found to be a disappointment to God – not that we could be as He has already forgiven us – but that we don’t want to be (practically) – we want to bring Him joy with our lives and gratitude as we start to understand just what exactly it is that He has forgiven us from and how much He has loved us (we do not want to grieve Him because we love Him, because we love Him we do not want to grieve Him)…

Jesus spoke some pretty straight things in Revelation 2-3…

That is the same Jesus speaking who Loves us so dearly and has forgiven us from our sins…

And yet He is not pretending that the “sin within us” isn’t there…

He’s open about it, He’s real about it…

He calls a spade a spade and He wants to remove it…

As we know His Grace, we are the ones who can respond to these scriptures with understanding…

We know His Heart…

We know what He wants for us…

We know that He is not self-seeking, He is seeking our heart…

We know that He is seeking His Father’s Glory and that He is also seeking our well being…

He wants us to be one with Him…

“Ask and you shall receive that your joy may be full”…

Thank You Jesus we ask for an understanding of Your Love to us Lord in Your Discipline and an understanding of just how holy we want to be (practically) before You at Your coming…

Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. (2 Corinthians 7:1 NASB)

The Fear of God for me is my reverential respect of who He is…

It is actually based on His Love for me, because I know that He has forgiven me completely and will never mention to me (“without reference to sin”) my sin because He has forgiven it and removed it as far away from me as the East is from the West – because I know this I fear Him…

He has my respect…

I feel guilty when I rebel against His Love or against His Grace – there is something inside me which just can’t do it – the Fear of the Lord or my respect for Him is this “thing”…

I just can’t do it…

When I still believe I’m under Law I can rebel and I can sin…

But when I see this complete forgiveness there is nothing to rebel against any more…

And as I see this in more and more areas in my life sin continues to drop off…

In the Fear (or Reverence) of the Lord…

Psalm 50 is an amazing Psalm which I “stumbled upon” this morning and was really blown away by (one verse in particular really blew me away)…

The Mighty One, God, the LORD, has spoken, And summoned the earth from the rising of the sun to its setting. Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God has shone forth. May our God come and not keep silence; Fire devours before Him, And it is very tempestuous around Him. He summons the heavens above, And the earth, to judge His people:

“Gather My godly ones to Me, Those who have made a covenant with Me by sacrifice.”

And the heavens declare His righteousness, For God Himself is judge. Selah.

“Hear, O My people, and I will speak; O Israel, I will testify against you; I am God, your God. I do not reprove you for your sacrifices, And your burnt offerings are continually before Me. I shall take no young bull out of your house Nor male goats out of your folds. For every beast of the forest is Mine, The cattle on a thousand hills. I know every bird of the mountains, And everything that moves in the field is Mine. If I were hungry I would not tell you, For the world is Mine, and all it contains. Shall I eat the flesh of bulls Or drink the blood of male goats? Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving And pay your vows to the Most High; Call upon Me in the day of trouble; I shall rescue you, and you will honor Me.”

But to the wicked God says,

“What right have you to tell of My statutes And to take My covenant in your mouth? For you hate discipline, And you cast My words behind you. When you see a thief, you are pleased with him, And you associate with adulterers. You let your mouth loose in evil And your tongue frames deceit. You sit and speak against your brother; You slander your own mother’s son. These things you have done and I kept silence; You thought that I was just like you; I will reprove you and state the case in order before your eyes. Now consider this, you who forget God, Or I will tear you in pieces, and there will be none to deliver. He who offers a sacrifice of thanksgiving honors Me; And to him who orders his way aright I shall show the salvation of God.”

It was the phrase,

May our God come and not keep silence;

which really caught my attention…

The preceding phrase really started to get my interest also…

And summoned the earth from the rising of the sun to its setting.

And this one also…

And the earth, to judge His people:

We will experience this in our day…

I really believe that…

It reminded me of a word which I got last year…

https://ahouseofprayerforthenations.wordpress.com/2012/01/11/christs-church/

I went back to that word after reading this phrase,

May our God come and not keep silence;

And realised that that phrase was used in that word a number of times…

I am coming and I will not be silent…

Four times to be exact and I didn’t know that that verse in Psalm 50 existed until this morning (obviously I’ve read it before but I’ve never “seen” it before this morning)…

I believe that this is very significant and whatever Judgement we receive we must (as those of us who know the Lord) know that it is to purify us and to keep us from being destroyed (condemned) along with the world…

But when we are judged, we are disciplined by the Lord so that we will not be condemned along with the world. (1 Corinthians 11:32 NASB)

Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. (John 3:18 NIV)

It is His Blessing on our lives (to judge or discipline us – not for the purpose of condemnation), it proves that we are not illegitimate children but are His true sons…

If you are not disciplined (and everyone undergoes discipline), then you are illegitimate children and not true sons. (Hebrews 12:8 NASB)

On the one hand we are so safe and so secure in His Hand but on the other hand once He has established that security in us it then frees Him to “go to town” on the remainder of sin in our lives as we see what He is doing…

We know our acceptance in Him is secure and He thus knows that we can handle the discipline process which He allows to come our way…

This could come our way through the enemy, through the enemies demons, through other unredeemed people, through other redeemed people who are practically unredeemed in certain areas or even through our own unredeemed remainder of flesh…

However it happens or through circumstances or any other living thing or object He (the Lord) will get through to us…

It is His Blessing on our lives…

We endure it…

If enabled by Him we can rejoice in it ( 🙂 )…

We can thank Him for it…

Sometimes it’s just enough to endure it and keep going – that’s all we’ve got…

but in this place of Grace – it is worth it…

It is worth it cos we see He’s thinking of us at our face to Face meeting (He wants us to be pure for Him – for our sake)…

I see this now…

I love You Jesus…

You are my Lord and my God…

I long for that face to Face meeting with You…

I’ve always been scared…

I’m starting to see that I have nothing to fear…

I am letting go of my fear…

And I am starting to trust Your Love for me…

Your Love for me is Perfect…

and this is the response which I want to give You…

a perfect response of pure gratitude before You on that day…

I am so grateful for Your reception of me…

I see myself accepted and welcomed…

I am so grateful…

Thank You Jesus…

Thank You Father…

Thank You Holy Spirit…

I want to be found worthy of the acceptance which You’ve given me…

Make me worthy Lord, I know I am in You, make me worthy in practice on that great day (and I know that You will whatever “level” I get up to in terms of my “readiness” but I strive ahead in this place of Grace to know You more – Thank You Jesus – You truly are a wide and open space and all the words You’ve given me about wide and open spaces are coming true – “this Grace in which we stand”)…

Thank You Jesus…

🙂