BBD 09.23.04 Chastening
Posted by: wrather <wrather@...>
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The Burning Bush Devotional
(Over 13,000 subscribers in 75 countries)
09.23.04
Chastening
Today’s devotional is from an article written by my son, Clark Wrather, for
his church newsletter. Clark is the pastor of the First Baptist Church of
Broken Bow, Oklahoma. The title and Scripture were added for the devotional.
Clark’s email is: storm@pine-net.com.
And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons: "My
son, do not despise the chastening of the LORD, nor be discouraged when you
are rebuked by Him; for whom the LORD loves He chastens, and scourges every
son whom He receives." - Hebrews 12:5-6.
If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is
there whom a father does not chasten? But if you are without chastening, of
which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons.
Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us, and we paid them
respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of
spirits and live? For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best
to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness.
Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful;
nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to
those who have been trained by it. - Hebrews 12:7-11.
If you know me at all, you know that I am a talker. I just love to talk to
people. My wife gets on to me sometimes for chatting away with complete
strangers when we are out of town.
I love to talk and evidently this can be passed down as a genetic heritage
to your children. My oldest son, Madison, loves to talk. Make the mistake of
asking him a question about something and he is going to tell you everything
he knows and everything he can possibly guess at concerning the subject. He
can go into excruciating detail about the video games he likes or about a
cartoon. He’s pretty excited about a new one coming out called, “Super Force
Hyper Team Monkey Go”. Just from watching the commercials he has picked out
a favorite. Imagine my experience in a fifteen minute conversation about
which monkey is probably the best in the new show based on the commercials.
As I said, he can talk at length about anything.
He has managed to make it through the first few weeks of school this year
without a personal visit from the, “board of education (a paddling)”. During
his first couple of years, he had a visit from the “board” within the first
week of the school year. The only trouble he has gotten into so far this
year is for talking.
He has told me several times that everyone in his class has been in trouble
for talking on certain days. I know he may be exaggerating, but his class
does seem to have a lot of chatterboxes in it. After a while, he was moved
to a new area. I asked him who was sitting around him in the new place and
he named all sorts of girls. It sounded like a good plan by his teacher to
tone the talking down until he named the last girl. She is a talker and a
good friend of Madison’s from his class last year and T-ball last summer.
He got in trouble numerous times for talking after that and I don’t even
want to imagine how much of class he wasted away chatting with his good
friend. Last week, there was a new development. He came home and told us
that he had been moved to a new place. I thought this was a wise move on his
Teacher’s part and I asked him who was seated around him. He got quiet for a
moment, gave a might sigh and lamented, “Just a machine! I just sit next to
a machine”. I am not altogether sure what the machine is, but I doubt it’s
the conversationalist his friend was at the old location.
In life, don’t be too surprised if God moves you to a different place. Don’t
be surprised when he moves you out of your comfort zone. Don’t be surprised
when he moves to change your behavior. Like a wise teacher, God will make
changes in your life to help you do better. He might make changes in your
health, finances, job, relationships or something else. Usually, we like
these changes as much as Madison likes sitting next to a machine, but those
changes are for our own good.
Copyright © 2004. Ed Wrather. Permission is given for use of the devotionals
on a non-profit basis with source credited. On June 8, 1998 the email
version of the Burning Bush Devotional was first sent.
Because of family illnesses, personal health concerns, and ministry
pressures I have been unable to write as frequently as I would like. For the
immediate future I will be resending devotionals written a few years ago.
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