WOULD WE RECOGNIZE DIVINE DISCIPLINE?

 

A friend recently asked me if God disciplines the Church for collective unfaithfulness the way God disciplined Israel.  Yes.  God repeatedly disciplined the assembly of Israel in order to move the people back to a faithful relationship (e.g. the punishments in the wilderness for unfaithfulness [“forgetting God”] after God had just delivered them from slavery in Egypt; see too Pss 39, 50, 107).  [Note: The Hebrew word for “assembly,” qhl, is translated in Greek by ecclesia, which in English is translated by “church.”]  As God disciplined the ecclesia of Israel, so God disciplines the NT ecclesia (e.g. Heb 12:1-13; Rev 3:14-22).

I’ll explain more below about “discipline,” but what strikes home to me is the question, Do we, the church collectively, and I personally, even recognize divine discipline in the midst of our lives?  Have I become blind to or accustomed to or numb to God’s discipline, so that I fail to respond by turning back to God, by repenting?  I need such self-examination.

Divine judgment -- discipline, when people turn back to God -- is a two-way street of accountability.  In the OT "hardening of heart" of a person (e.g. Pharaoh) is attributed to both God and to the person. The consequence is a "distance" between God and the person that makes it more difficult to know God.  A similar line of thought comes from the prophets who use a creation-theology argument: when people sin, they are reversing the creational order and bringing chaos back into their lives.  That is to say, when people reject the guidance of their Creator, God “steps back” and withdraws his life-giving order.  This prophetic argument of creational reversal is also how Paul is thinking in Rom 1 about the wrath of God "handing people over" to their own depraved minds, to what they want.  “Sin” (self-rule) works against divine order and brings chaos, suffering and death.  The thinking in the OT and NT seems to be that God's discipline is sometimes allowing us the "natural" consequences of sin; other times, it seems more active.  More importantly is that I am faced with the question: Do I, or we the Church, even see what is happening and respond to God or sink deeper into a hardness of heart?

Lord, I do not want a hard heart toward you and anything that you are doing in my life.  I want the Church, your Body, to present a witness to the world of your goodness and holiness.  Help me to see and respond to the consequences of my unfaithfulness with quick repentance in order to restore a closer walk with you.  Amen.