NIGERIA BAPTIST CONVENTION SEEK DAILY (NBC) Thursday, October 12 BE DISCIPLINED

RBT: Matthew 27-28

Memory Verse: Fully embrace God's correction as part of your training, for he is doing what any loving father does for his children. For who has ever heard of a child who never had been corrected? Hebrews 12:7 TPT

Bible Text: Hebrews 12:7-11

12:7 Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as his children. For what children are not disciplined by their father? 

12:8 If you are not disciplined—and 

everyone undergoes discipline—then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all. 

12:9 Moreover, we have all had human fathers who disciplined us and we respected them for it. How much more should we submit to the Father of spirits and live! 

12:10 They disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness. 

12:11 No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. 

12:12 Therefore, strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees.

Coach Tom Landry of the Dallas Cowboy said, “The job of a coach is to make men do what they don't want to do, in order to be what they've always wanted to be!” Similarly, God's discipline is far more than its corrective function or punishment but a means of teaching and training to make us better Christians. 

Today's passage highlights the purpose of God's discipline in the form of suffering and encourages us to continue in faithful endurance. Although discipline is unpleasant, it is purposeful and beneficial to make us who God desires. 

The suffering described in today's text does not attempt to explain why bad things happen to good people or imply advice to those suffering ill-treatment in abusive relationships. Rather, the passage points to situations wherein the Christian community is vulnerable to persecutions. God's discipline has both present and future goals. The goal of His discipline is to enhance our sharing in His divine holiness (v. 10) and be prepared for eternal life (v. 11). 

_Friend, do not despair but see the challenges you go through as proof that you are indeed a beloved child of God. By enduring persecutions and sufferings, you acknowledge your status as God's legitimate child._

Insight: God makes us better Christians through discipline.

Prayer: I receive the grace to face and triumph over every challenge that comes my way.