(Part 2/3 – A summary of the Sunday morning teaching on 05-Jul-15, in AFT Church, English service. From the series The Foundation For Victorious Living)

CAN ANY GOOD COME OUT OF CHASTENING?

No chastening or disciplining is ever pleasant right then. But we’ll definitely reap its benefit later on in life. Exercising ourselves into holiness leads us to a good life, not just for now but also for eternity.

Here’s an extraordinary story of an ordinary man who rose up in life because of his mother’s disciplining. Benjamin Carson was a poor boy born to a not-very-educated mother. His father abandoned the family and took off with another woman. His mother worked three jobs to raise her sons. He recalls being at the bottom of his class as a young boy. His worried mother sought God for wisdom to bring up her boys. So, she told the boys that she wanted them to borrow books from the public library and produce book reports for two books every week. She restricted their television viewing and recreation time. He was unhappy with his mother’s strict schedule. But she didn’t budge. Grudgingly, he obeyed her. Within one year, Benjamin Carson shot up to the top of the class. Soon, he graduated with flying colors, got admitted to the Yale University and went onto become a great brain surgeon. Today, he is extremely respected, wealthy and doing well. Carson owes his success to his mother’s foresight in disciplining and chastening him. His mum, he says, is his greatest hero.

When He sees us leading a life of sloth and waste, God gets angry. The loving Father heart in Him reaches out to set us back on track. In that process, He may chasten and discipline us. But, let us not forget that His anger springs out of His love for us.

2) GOD THE FATHER AND GOD THE SON

Some people imagine that the Father God is an angry being whilst Jesus the Son is the loving One!

Boy, could we be farther from the truth!?

We must consider the Bible holistically to gather an accurate picture of God. Let me cite a few well known verses to point out the fallacy of the above statement.

a) John 3:16 says, ‘For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life’. The Son didn’t come on His own accord. The Father God loved the world and it was He who initiated the process of sending His Son Jesus to the earth.

b) Romans 8:32 says, ‘He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?’ God delivered His Son to die for us. God loved us (sinners deserving punishment) and delivered His Son (Jesus) as our punishment so that we’d be saved! Can there be any love greater than that?

c) Acts 2:23-24 says, ‘Him, being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have takenby lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death; whom God raised up, having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that He should be held by it.’ As Peter taught on the day of the Pentecost, he reminded his audience that Jesus’ death and resurrection was not a chance accident. It was the unfolding of a carefully determined, purposed and thought out plan of God. It was the manifestation of God’s love.

d) Romans 3:26 says, ‘to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.’ The sinner’s punishment was death. God allowed His Son Jesus to be placed on the Cross and heaped our sins on Him. The Just God also became the Justifier when He let Jesus bear our sins and die on our behalf.

e) 1 John 4:10 says, ‘In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins’. God became the subject and object of propitiation.

…to be continued…

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