The Peaceful Fruit of Righteousness

In Chapter 8 of his book Children of the Living God, Sinclair Ferguson discusses the function of Discipline in the life of the child of God. He says that, “Discipline is intended to produce holiness of life and character – a quality of life that is pleasing to God, because it shares in his own holy nature.” By this I took him to mean that God’s hand of discipline upon those who he has adopted as children is intended to help in our sanctification. His discipline helps us to become more God-like. Likewise our attitude toward God’s discipline will reflect our attitude toward holiness. If we eagerly desire to be holy before God we will welcome His disciplining hand.

This discipline which makes us holy is not always a diving thumping for some specific sin on my part. It is often a struggle or trial that God places in our lives with the purpose of driving us to rely on and draw our strength and joy from Him. If our attitude towards this process of becoming holy is not favorable we will fail to grow in Christian maturity and our lives will lack the “marks of God’s workmanship.”

Ferguson draws from Hebrews 12:10-11 in describing the way by which our live yield this “peaceful fruit of righteousness” as the writer calls it. I think that we should examine verses 12 & 13 of Hebrews 12 as well, “(12) Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, (13) and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed.” If verses 10-11 provide us with the indicatives regarding this use of suffering by God, then verses 12 & 13 must, at least partially, provide us with imperatives for how we are to live in light of suffering.

We are not to be merely passive recipients of God’s disciplining. Instead, we are to seek within the painful circumstances of that discipline the lessons for greater holiness and dependency upon God. Interestingly, verse 13 seems to be a warning to us that failure to have a positive attitude towards suffering leading to holiness can actually cause harm to us rather than provide healing growth. My mother is a wonderful, godly woman and a breast cancer survivor. Last year while undergoing treatment I saw her suffer greatly and, at times, despairing, but the one thing she kept reminding herself (and all of us) of is that God works all things for our good. Today she is healthy and cancer free. It is kind of strange to hear her speak of the cancer now as if it was almost an old friend (an old friend we never want to see again). There is a sense of fondness in remembering that time, not necessarily for the cancer its self, but for the days and months during which we were all driven to rely on God. Today my mother bears more prominently the marks of God’s workmanship by his loving discipline.