How Do I Know If I’m Being Disciplined by God?

00:00:00.000 | I know God disciplines me because the Bible tells me so, but Pastor John, how do I know

00:00:10.100 | when I'm personally experiencing God's discipline?

00:00:13.800 | Here's one of the most remarkable things about God's ordaining hard things in our lives in

00:00:21.840 | a disciplinary way.

00:00:23.680 | Jesus was disciplined and never sinned.

00:00:28.920 | Notice what I mean.

00:00:30.200 | Hebrews 5.8, it says Jesus learned obedience from what he suffered.

00:00:37.240 | Now a lot of people read that and say, "Whoa, learned obedience.

00:00:40.800 | You mean like he stopped being disobedient and became obedient and thus sinned?"

00:00:46.080 | No, that's not what it says and that's not what it means.

00:00:49.520 | When it says he learned obedience, he means he moved as he grew from one degree of obedience

00:00:57.400 | to another.

00:00:58.400 | Here comes a new challenge and he becomes obedient again.

00:01:01.200 | Here comes a new kind of challenge and he becomes obedient again.

00:01:04.400 | He's learning at each stage the actual implementation of his obedient heart in acts of obedience

00:01:12.840 | and he's doing it through what he suffered, which means that God ordained suffering in

00:01:20.800 | the life of Jesus to bring him to the fullest expression of obedience.

00:01:26.720 | Now the reason that's important is because we, I think, forget that God's hand of discipline

00:01:35.760 | may be on us not simply to spank us because we've been bad, but to stretch us and broaden

00:01:43.600 | us in what we're doing well.

00:01:46.720 | Job, remember, was described in the very first verse as being an upright man and blameless.

00:01:53.840 | And God gives Satan permission to beat up on him.

00:01:57.280 | And it wasn't because Job was acting in any overt, sinful way that needed discipline,

00:02:03.560 | but it did turn out in the end that Job had some sediment of pride at the bottom of his

00:02:09.760 | life that got jostled up into that beaker of life.

00:02:15.480 | That's my picture.

00:02:17.040 | He's got the sediment at the bottom and then you shake the glass and whoa, there it comes.

00:02:21.620 | And at the end in chapter 42, he says, "I've got to repent in dust and ashes.

00:02:25.480 | I've said things I shouldn't have said."

00:02:28.400 | And so God is always, I think, always disciplining us.

00:02:32.280 | Here's another factor.

00:02:33.880 | In Romans 2, 4, it says, "Don't you know that the kindness of God is meant to lead

00:02:42.960 | you to repentance?"

00:02:44.960 | So now here you have God using another strategy besides spanking, besides suffering, to bring

00:02:52.360 | us to repentance.

00:02:53.600 | So we're doing something we shouldn't be doing.

00:02:55.500 | He sees something defective in our life.

00:02:57.640 | And what does he do?

00:02:58.680 | He makes the sun shine.

00:02:59.680 | I mean, I'll give you an illustration.

00:03:02.480 | I one time got really mad at Noelle because I found a whole crate of rotten pears in the

00:03:07.280 | garage.

00:03:08.280 | This is about 35 years ago and we were still teaching.

00:03:11.020 | And she had forgotten these fruits she bought and it just rotted in the garage.

00:03:15.660 | And I went into her and said, "What's with the pears?"

00:03:18.500 | "Oh, I forgot them."

00:03:19.980 | A whole crate of pears just rotted in the garage.

00:03:22.380 | I'm just getting down on her like I've never done anything like that.

00:03:27.420 | And she kind of went back to her bedroom.

00:03:30.180 | She's hurt and I'm mad as all get out.

00:03:34.420 | To kill time, I pick up the garbage and I take it outside to put it by the street because

00:03:38.820 | it's garbage pick up day.

00:03:40.860 | And when I got on the driveway, the sun was as bright as glorious could be.

00:03:47.980 | The sky was blue.

00:03:49.620 | A sweet breeze was blowing on my face.

00:03:54.500 | And I stopped and cried.

00:03:57.140 | I just cried because God was kissing me on the cheek after that rotten attitude.

00:04:04.980 | And it broke me like no...

00:04:08.420 | He could have caused a car to careen over the curb and smack me smack into the hospital

00:04:14.540 | and he would have been absolutely right to do so.

00:04:17.100 | But instead, he smiled upon me.

00:04:20.180 | So the point there is God is always disciplining us.

00:04:23.860 | He's always doing things good, hard, and gentle to us.

00:04:30.060 | And so what we need to remember is that we're always loved.

00:04:33.940 | Hebrews 12, 6, he disciplines those whom he loves.

00:04:39.940 | For God's children, no spanking is ever anything but love.

00:04:46.220 | And there are people I know who have a very hard time feeling loved by God.

00:04:52.820 | Their dad treat them in such a way that they never felt affirmed.

00:04:58.660 | They never felt delighted in.

00:05:01.100 | They never felt accepted.

00:05:02.460 | They could never measure up.

00:05:04.340 | He's always on their case, spank and criticize and speak ugly words.

00:05:10.220 | So when I say to them that God disciplines us in love, that's very hard for them to feel.

00:05:18.460 | The difference between a dad like that and our God who disciplines us in love is that

00:05:26.420 | God never, never feels contemptuous of us.

00:05:33.220 | In other words, a dad often in his sinful meanness will say, "You're such an idiot.

00:05:41.420 | You always do that," and maybe hit them.

00:05:45.420 | And his words are contemptuous.

00:05:47.900 | They're despising.

00:05:49.660 | God never says, "You always did that.

00:05:52.380 | You're just an idiot.

00:05:53.380 | You never do anything right."

00:05:55.460 | God never loses control like that.

00:05:58.460 | If he spanks, if he brings any kind of hardship into our life, it's with measured, careful,

00:06:05.500 | wise, loving application of his wisdom and his grace to our situation.

00:06:12.300 | And so he's calling for us to have greater faith and greater humility.

00:06:18.820 | And I think my final underlying answer to the person who asks, "Well, then how do I

00:06:24.460 | know if I'm being disciplined?"

00:06:26.700 | I think what they're really asking is, "How do I know if I've sinned?"

00:06:32.220 | And the answer to that is, "Read your Bible."

00:06:36.220 | Don't base your conclusion about whether you've done something wrong on how God is treating

00:06:42.380 | you, because that's going to be very confusing, because sometimes he treats you way better

00:06:47.060 | than you deserve, and sometimes he spanks you in order to bring it to your attention,

00:06:52.020 | but you can't tell which it is.

00:06:53.580 | And so you need to decide, "Am I sinning by looking at the Word of God and discerning

00:06:59.540 | what was my behavior like?"

00:07:01.420 | Thank you, Pastor John, and thank you for listening to this podcast.

00:07:04.660 | Email your Bible questions to us at AskPastorJohn@DesiringGod.org.

00:07:08.460 | You can find thousands of other free resources online from John Piper at DesiringGod.org.

00:07:11.820 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke.

00:07:13.580 | Thanks for listening.

00:07:14.180 | [end]

00:07:14.680 | 1.

00:07:15.680 | Are you a sinner?

00:07:16.680 | 2.

00:07:17.680 | Is it a good thing to sin?

00:07:18.680 | 3.

00:07:19.680 | Is it a bad thing to sin?

00:07:20.680 | 4.

00:07:21.680 | Is it a good thing to be a sinner?

00:07:22.680 | 5.

How Do I Know If I’m Being Disciplined by God?

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