As we come back to Hebrews today, we are in chapter 12 as you know. We've been there for a few weeks and I think this is our third week in chapter 12 and all that we've been looking at has prepared us for this sermon on this Father's Day. You'll remember coming out of the 11th chapter we had been speaking about faith, the importance of faith. how it's foundational to who we are as a people. And because of faith, we persevere, we endure. And all those examples given to us in chapter 11 of Hebrews are examples of those who had faith and by faith persevered. These are people who dealt with great challenges. Any idea that Christians will not encounter challenges and difficulties, well they just haven't read the Word because the Word says we will regularly encounter them and we've established that, I pray, over the last several weeks. But these saints of God had their challenges and their struggles but they endured them. This is nothing new. The generation that this author is writing to, it's nothing new. It's what God's people have always endured. Now you'll remember that the call then is to be encouraged and to run with endurance. He goes to the imagery of a stadium, an Olympic stadium, and you enter that stadium and you're surrounded by this cloud of witnesses. And we spoke about how that is those who have a testimony set before us, those who came before us, those who themselves ran the race with faithfulness, enduring, patiently. enduring, even sometimes suffering, but their race is finished. They sit there as victorious ones in the stands and now it's our turn to enter the track and run. And the implicit argument of Hebrews is how shall you run? Will you run also with endurance, the race set before you? Now, implicit in all this is that to run that race well means you have to train and endure and do all the things that an athlete does. That's why the author uses this picture. We talked about that two weeks ago. If you're going to be a great athlete, you must train, you must be steadfast, you must be dedicated, and you must endure hardship. In fact, the very nature of training is hardship, isn't it? You're putting your body to the very limits of what it can take so that it'll grow stronger and faster and will endure more. And so this is an apt image for the Christian life. We are not to be lazily sitting back in the Christian life, but we are to be actively involved in the Christian life. We mentioned then, Paul says, to make this point in 1 Corinthians, I'm not as one beating the air. He's giving an allusion to boxing. I'm not one who's just simply training to shadow box the rest of my life. No, there's a battle coming up. I'm training for an actual time in the ring. Because if you're not, then you're not going to advance. You're not taking it seriously. And so that's what our author has tried to get to us over and over again. And so the lifestyle of an athlete is one who endures hardship, suffering, and deprivation. And why would you do that? This is what our author brings us back to the last two weeks. Why would you do that? Why would anybody do that? For joy set before them. For a glory set before them. In the case of the Olympics, for Olympic glory set before them. To have their name amongst the pantheon of the greatest athletes who ever lived. The greatest athletes in the world. That's what they strive for. And if they achieve it, every sweat, every drop of sweat, every teardrop, every bit of blood that they've shed will seem worth it to them in the end. And our author is asking us to consider that same thing because we don't only have the examples of the saints of old, but our author says, look unto Jesus, focus upon Jesus. What better example can you find than him? For he also endured a course of suffering, also endured a course of shame, also endured all these difficulties. And he did it for the glory set before him as well. And that glory was fulfillment of the plan of God to redeem lost sinners. And so my friends, as we look at this, we see this model build up for us of suffering and of entering into training and of difficulty and all of that leading to a good end. You see, the point we need to remember is in the moment of trial and tribulation and suffering and difficulty, we never see a good ended in that moment, right? It's a difficult moment. But our author is asking us to reframe it and think about it differently in God's providence that we too are being trained and developed and sanctified for the work the Lord has for us. Now, he says here that Jesus endured and now he also sits as a victor, not in the stadium, so to speak, that the other witnesses do, but no, the author says he sits in a different position. He sits enthroned at the right hand of God the Father. He has taken his rightful place as our messianic Lord and high priest according to the order of Melchizedek. He rules and he reigns today. So my friends, as you think about what Christ suffers, then our author is asking the audience in his day to reconsider what they are suffering. Yes, you're losing esteem. You're losing some financing, but you have not even suffered to the point of shedding blood yet. And yet we just spoke of Christ who gave his life for you. My friends, think about the example of Christ. And so as we come to this text today, we want to look at this, the way the author now transitions into another picture, and that of fatherly discipline and training. So I want to read our text again. Ben read it for us a moment ago, but we want to read it one more time so it's fresh in our minds and listen carefully and think about what the author is saying here. He says, Nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by him, for whom the Lord loves he chastens, and scourges every son whom he receives. If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons. For what son is there whom a father does not chasten? But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons. Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection to the Father of spirits and live? For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness. Now, no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful. Nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. Amen. The Lord provided us a good text for Father's Day today, and so we will run with it. And as we do that today, I want us to look at two points. First of all, a task for fathers, and second of all, a grace unto us. And as we begin to do that, let's have a word of prayer. Father, help us now. to see the truth of your word. Speak to us through it, Father. Help us to understand the message of this scripture faithfully, and help us, Father, to understand why it's important for us. In Christ's name, Amen. Alright, we come now to our first point, which is a task for fathers. Now, Today's Father's Day. I'm sure you're aware of that. And it's a day that we honor fathers and give thanksgiving to God for our fathers. And being a father is a difficult task. I don't say that because I'm a father. Anybody who's a father knows it's a difficult task. Anyone who's a mother knows that's a difficult task. Being a parent is a difficult task because we realize that God has given us a precious gift. and that that gift is dependent upon us, right? That child is dependent on its parents to raise it, help it to survive, and then also to train it up in the path it should go. And so we see that here no less with fathers. Fathers are given this important direction and calling. They have a task. And our author says one of those tasks is discipline. And so I think For a moment, you can see why Arthur jumps to this picture. I think he used it for three reasons. First of all, because the background picture has been, why fathers, by the way, is so important here, that the background picture has been the Olympic Games. In the days of this author, women didn't compete. It was male games. Now we have men in women's Olympic sports, so it's a little different. But in those days, it would have been men, so it, of course, would have fit the picture he's going for. Second of all, It reminds us that we are all counted in as male heirs, right? The eldest male was the recipient of the greatest blessings of inheritance. And so we all stand in Christ, Paul reckons through this in Romans, as male heirs in Christ. And then lastly, he also wants to make this point, and the reason he's dealing with sons and fathers, is the author is going to reference a text that deals with a son directly. Now as he does that, as he turns immediately to the third proverb, he has us to think for a moment about the importance of this one because, again, it's a famous proverb. We even went to it in Sunday school this morning to talk about not leaning on our own understanding, but trusting in the Lord, which is from that psalm. It's a psalm that certainly we know, but Jewish Christians who had been raised in Judaism would have known that psalm very, very well because the psalm is often titled like instruction to a son. something like that. It's a word of wisdom given to a son on how they ought to model their life or live their life that they might live as someone faithful in the community of God. And so as we think about that, the author immediately knows that his audience will have been familiar with this psalm, or excuse me, this proverb, and he says to them, you've missed it. You've missed this proverb. This proverb had something very important to tell you about why you're in this moment of chastening, and you should have listened. You should have regarded that proverb, but you've forgotten it. Now that proverb is all about the wisdom that's offered to a son, as I said a moment ago, but there are many things that it says in it. that a son should do what is right, that he should listen to his father, that he should not lean on his own understanding but trust in the Lord's wisdom that he has given to us, that he should be careful with his finances to honor the Lord, and that wisdom is greater than any earthly treasure that we might accumulate. All these things are said as a pathway for a young man to live a righteous life. And yet as our author thinks about this text, a text that they would have known well, He says the part you really missed is found in verses 11 and 12 of the third proverb, which he quotes in our text today. My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord, nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by him. For whom the Lord loves, he chastens and scourges every son whom he receives. Now, again, that is right there in the third proverb. We don't have to wonder about that. You can turn back if you want to verify, but it's there. And it's a reminder to Israel that discipline is a part of the raising of a son, the part of raising of children in general. But if we're going to speak about a son, discipline and chastening is a part of how we are raised in a godly manner. It's not absent from it, but it's a part of it. In fact, as we think for a moment about what this author is saying is we realize that fathers have a role in this. I remember that because I remember many times being told by my mom, you just wait till your father comes home. And those words sent a jolt through the heart, knowing that sometimes it was dad's duty to be the disciplinarian. And that was part of learning right from wrong, learning what is appropriate and what is not appropriate. But what's interesting is there's a group of believers who say, I thought God loved us. And yet all we find is tribulation and trouble. All we find is hardship and difficulty. I thought God loved us. Now, the Bible tells us over and over again this is the wrong way to think. Today's message is about it's the wrong way to think. But we can see it in many places, right? The entire argument really of 2 Corinthians is that the super apostles are making the argument that Paul can't truly be an apostle of God because God doesn't like Paul very much. Well, what is the evidence of that? Everywhere he goes, people arrest him. They stone him. They give him hardship. They don't like his messages. He's not beloved the way we are. When we preach, nobody gets offended. When we preach, everybody says, keep going. When will you be back to preach again? Nobody puts us in jail. Nobody hates us. They love us. So if Paul is an apostle, We're more than that. That's where that title most eminent apostles or super apostles come from. If Paul's an apostle, we're greater than him. We must be super apostles. Of course, it's ridiculous. I love Paul's response right from the beginning of 2 Corinthians. You don't know the half of it, right? You don't know the half of how I've suffered for the Lord because he's called me into this. And sometimes I can later understand why and sometimes I can't, but I know God is faithful and he is doing something. And so my friends, in the same way our author's telling today, that just because you enter hardship, it doesn't mean that the person who's allowing you to go through hardship hates you. Writers bring wrath upon you, but sometimes allowing you to endure these things for your good. Why doesn't my mom, like in those days, why didn't she say, after she cooled down a little bit, you know, or whatever, 30 minutes later, say, you know what, don't worry about that, I won't say a thing to your father. Because it wasn't for my good to get away with things. It wasn't for my good to be able to say whatever I wanted to her and there'd be no consequences. This is the kind of thing we have to reckon through, right? There has to be training in righteousness. Now that's not unique to parenthood. Our author's already told us about this, hasn't he? How are you going to be a great athlete? Through rigorous training, not through ease. Not through being allowed everything you want. Let's say you're an Olympic athlete and you say, man, I'm going to hire a coach that's less difficult on me. That might seem joyous for the day, maybe for the week. But what's going to happen to your goals when the coach is like, you know what? I think you've done enough. It's already been about 80 minutes of training. Let's just call it a day. What about when he says, like our allusion to a diet a couple of weeks ago, if you want that fettuccine Alfredo, just eat it, enjoy it. If you could eat a whole cheese cake, hey, it's your birthday, take advantage. Is that conducive to attaining the prize? Of course not. It might seem joyous in the moment, but the end of it is failure. And my friends, if we think about it, we can see this in many areas. We have a young man in this congregation who is right now at Parris Island training. Now, if you would ask the soldier on Parris Island what would he like things to be like, he's gonna say, let's have a room that's like the Four Seasons. Let me get up when I want to, let me eat when I want to, let me train when I want to, and let me rest when I want to. And if he gets a drill sergeant that comes in and says, hey, that's what we're gonna do, he's gonna say, that is the best, that guy's the best. Until a couple of years later when he's in combat and he's totally unprepared and his life might be taken. the whole country might be failed and that we don't have an adequate defense in the day of trial. We realize that we put those young men through all kinds of miseries to toughen them up, to steel them, to make them ready for the day of trial. And that means it must be difficult. You're not sleeping, you know, in a king-size fluffy bed. You're sleeping on a really difficultly hard mattress, right? And you're getting up when you don't want to. And sometimes after very little sleep, and you're eating what they tell you you're allowed to eat, and you're allowed to sit down when they tell you you've got a few minutes off. And the rest of the time, run and hike and run the course again, because that's what is conducive to building a marine. So my friends, we realize this is the same thing. And the father we may want when we're children is a father who says, you know what? You shouldn't have done that, but don't worry about it. Or you know what? You said some awful thing to your teacher or to your mother. Try to do better. Try to do better. My friends, that kind of permissiveness is maybe what we would have wanted when we were a child. But would it have been for our good? Think about that. Would it have been for our good? Would it have trained us to do rightly? Would it have trained us in righteousness? No, I think we know the answer would be disastrous. The answer would be disastrous. You cannot train for something good by training haphazardly, easily, without dedication. It's a principle we see everywhere, not just in the soldier, not just in the athlete, but throughout life. It requires steadfast dedication and training to achieve things that are good. And so the third proverb reminds us that God is at work in the same way. He allows us to endure things that we would not want to endure. He allows us to go through trials and tribulations that we would avoid if we had the power to. because it's for our good. Now, sometimes that's really hard for us to grasp. In the moment, particularly, it's hard for us to grasp. But my friends, if you think about going back to the example of a father, there are many times as fathers and grandfathers that we can remove the difficulty from our children or grandchildren. There are many times we can bail them out, right? We can get them out of trouble. We can swoop in and save the day. And sometimes we do that, maybe rightly or wrongly, and sometimes we don't do that because we recognize, no, this time they have to be the one to stand. They have to be the one to learn. They have to be the one to pay the price. They have to be the one. But what our author is telling us is it's the same with God. There are many times that we are in moments of trial and tribulation and we sit here and think our God is sovereign, all-powerful. It would be nothing for Him to remove this from our pathway. And you know what? That's absolutely true, isn't it? God could remove any difficulty from our pathway. We've seen Him do it in history past. The Old Testament is full of examples of how God raised His people to victory against incredible odds, removed difficulties out of their path. The New Testament likewise is full of miraculous things that God by His power has done for His people. And yet sometimes He doesn't. That's just the reality of it. He delivers, Peter and James dies. He opens the door to evangelism in one area, in another area it fails miserably. And we don't understand these things because we're not God. Just a little clue in if you didn't know that today. You're not God, right? He knows what we don't know, and he understands what we don't understand, and he's working to fulfill the mission that he has. But in all these things, we realize that we're allowed to go through difficulties for our good and God's glory. And that brings me to my second point this morning, which is a grace to us. Our hardships are a grace to us. Now that is something that is so foreign sometimes to our way of thinking, but it's what our author is telling us today. It's also what we read elsewhere in scripture. What about Peter in his first epistle? That sometimes, though for a little while, we may go through trials and tribulations. He makes the illusion. This is a principle we can understand even in the world we live in. You don't have a more pure silver by leaving it in the cool air. You put it in the crucible, you put it in the fire, and in the fire it purifies because all the impurities of the silver rise to the top, and the silversmith scrapes them away, and then he reshapes the silver and cools it down, and now it's not 90% pure silver, it's 99% pure silver. And Peter says, you, your faith is more precious than silver that perishes, and therefore why would you be surprised that God would put your faith into the fire? Realizing that it goes in and comes out more pure as you trust in Him and learn to trust in the Lord and be delivered by Him. So we come to these Hebrew Christians this morning that we're reading about and they look all around them and say, where is God's care for us? Have you ever thought that way, said something like that? Where's God's love to me? It seems like it's one thing after another, one problem after another. I get through one thing and here's the next thing. And it's easy to think this way. But our Lord tells us through this word, He says that if we ever get to the moment we think this is wrath, it's not wrath. God's wrath does not abide upon His people. Christ took that upon Himself for His people. What we're dealing with is chastening. These corrections and difficulties that we will endure that will train us in righteousness. And he says, in fact, it's not a sign of God's hatred of you, but His love of you. For whom the Lord loves, He chastens, our author tells us. just like a sign of love with an earthly father is instruction and discipline. It's hard to believe that when you're the child and your father is teaching you a lesson, it's not always easy to identify this is love and this is instruction and this is for my good. But as we grow, we realize it, don't we? We realize all those things our parents did to guide us and to teach us was for our good. They loved us. They loved us. Now, it's not surprising that we wouldn't love it in the moment. If you look at verse 11, what does it say? The first part of verse 11 says, Now again, we can make any of those illusions we want to. What Samuel is going through right now is not joyful. It's painful. to go through all the training that they will put him through. The Olympic athletes that are finalizing their preparation for the Olympics this summer are going through great pain, great discomfort in their training. That's just a part of what it is. It's not joyful in the moment. And as a child, when you're on the wrong side of needing a lesson taught to you, it's not joyful, right? It's painful. But it's for our good. The athlete who's enduring pain now receives joy later. The soldier who endures pain now receives joy later. When Samuel finishes his course and gets to leave Paris Island, there'll be a joy in achieving something great. And he will have achieved something great. He will have achieved something great by perseverance. In the same way, we don't enjoy the disciplines of our parents when we're young. But walking a righteous path as an adult, you look back and say, thank God for my mom and dad. Thank God for those that guided me in the right way, those who trained me up in a way of righteousness. What's that worth? You can't put a price on it. It's worth everything. And so my friends, as you look at this and think about this text from what we begin to realize here, that he's having us to rethink for a moment, the events that we're in, the moments that we're in, that yes, God could remove us from, but chooses not to. That God could alleviate, but chooses not to. In fact, it might be God's will for it to get harder, more difficult, more challenging. Now when you think about that for a moment, we're told why this is. For what son is there whom a father does not chasten? If your father doesn't have any part in your life, doesn't chasten you, doesn't correct you, it probably means he doesn't care about you. Let's just be honest about that for a moment. To do the hard work of parenting, and it is hard work, is meaning something. It's a commitment. Just like being a friend is a commitment. That means I'm going to stand with you through thick and thin. Being a husband is a commitment. It means I'm going to stick with you through thick and thin. Being a member of a church is like that too, right? It's a family relationship. And so there's these difficult things that we wrestle with and think about. But again, we notice here what he's saying, that if the father loves his son, he will chasten him. And Arthur says we must understand this in human divine terminology. Now, what do I mean there? The Bible often does this, right? It'll point to a trait about a human being and then it'll say our Father is greater than this. I'll give the example often of the judge, you know, the woman that comes and knocks on the judge's door. She wants a favorable ruling and the judge just gets tired of her bothering him to the point where he finally says, I'm going to give her what she wants so she'll leave me alone. And this is a message to not grow tired in praying. Now you think for a moment, if you think about this wrongly, you think it's not a very flattering picture of God, right? If we pester Him enough, then He'll finally do what we want. Except all of theology tells us we can't force God to do anything. He's God. We are not. And so what is it saying? It's saying if a human, unrighteous judge will give you what you want if you ask, how much more will your Father who is good and has all power give you those things which are for your good if you ask? And sometimes we ask things that aren't for our good. And God doesn't give them to us. Or he may give them to us to teach us a lesson on why we shouldn't have asked for it in the first place when it all blows up in our face. I'm not going to try to sum up how God works here today because it's very complicated. His measures are vast. But we recognize here that God, if an earthly judge does in the end what is right because it's convenient, how much more will your heavenly Father who's righteous do what's right because it's right? Well, in the same way, we're given the example of our fathers. If you had a godly father, praise the Lord for that. And he did the best he could. I'm an earthly father. I did the best I could, you know, and I'm sure there's a lot of places that you could critique and say, eh, probably should have been handled differently. We fail. We're human beings. And yet what our author says in looking at this text is even the fact that we had earthly fathers, it says we had earthly fathers, human fathers who corrected us and we paid them respect for it. You're not going to give glory to God when He corrects you? You're not going to give glory to God when He allows you to go through a valley that is for your good to train you in righteousness and to teach you to do the right things? Notice he says a little further beyond that. chastened us as seemed best to them. In other words, they disciplined us for a short time of our life the best that they could. And we realize that as parents, right? We grow in wisdom ourselves and we think, oh, there are a lot of things I would do differently. But we did the best we could. We did as we thought was right at the time. And this contrast again comes back. Our Heavenly Father doesn't try. He does. He doesn't do as best he can. He does perfectly. It isn't like overall I hope I did good for my kids. God works perfectly in his children. And so if we look back with esteem at our fathers and say they did a good job, they trained me up in righteousness, they did the best that they could as they knew how, how much more should we give glory to God who knows all things, knows perfectly how to be our Father and to lead us through both good and bad. Now if you think about this for a moment, it's going to lead us, isn't it, to an important discussion on providence. On providence. Because again, what this is saying is God allows us to go through both good and bad for our good. For our good. It's kind of what Paul's getting at in Romans 8, right? That he works all things together for good for those who love him and are called according to his purpose. God is taking the good and the bad and using them. He could alleviate all these things for us He chooses not to. And there's much written on this, we know, and helpful resources to think this through. But our author of Hebrews just says, just think for a moment about it. Yes, if God didn't want you to have any trials in the city that you're in, He could remove them. He could make it easier to be a Christian than to be the Jew that you're thinking about going back to being. He could make it easier to be in the church than to be in the synagogue. And He's chosen not to do that. Now, why has He chosen not to do that? And if we say, well, it isn't, you know, God has no part in this, then again, we're not understanding what the Bible says about the sovereignty of God and what this text is saying about the sovereignty of God. God allows you to endure these things for the same principle that Peter was talking about at the silversmith, that our faith will be put to the fire and purified. We'll learn to trust Him more. We'll learn to understand God's providence. If there's anything that Romans 8 is telling us is, He allows us to go through all these events, good and bad, for our good and for His glory. And that's what this author is saying. When you begin to gripe about your drill sergeant, when you begin to gripe about your coach, that he's too hard on me, I wish it were just a little bit easier. You do today, but you won't in Paris this summer. or you want at the end of the course, maybe when you're on the battlefield, and you're going to have to rely on that training and the guy next to you's training to make it through. You're going to be thankful for all that you had to endure. And in the same way as Paul in 2 Corinthians is defending his walk and all the trials and tribulations he went through, he says, you don't know the half of it because sometimes I was at the point where I thought I despaired even for life, Paul says, for life itself. But it seems like Paul was at a point where he was saying, it might be better for me to die. And yet all these things, God worked for his glory and for the gospel. I don't know if you've really ever considered that. You know, Paul gives a defense later in the book of all that he's been through, the shipwrecks and the scourgings and all those things that he's endured. And I'll be honest with you, sometimes when my view of providence is a little bit small, I read the life of Paul and I sit here and think, how much more could have been accomplished if Paul wasn't in jail for three years here? Except that makes me wiser than God, right? Because God's the one who allowed him to sit there for three years. Oh, and by the way, to write a good chunk of the New Testament during that time so that Paul isn't just witnessing to people in his day, but by the power of the Holy Spirit to the church throughout the next 2,000 plus years. So my friends, as we think about this for a moment, this causes us to rethink our circumstances, to rethink the moment we're in. When things are good, the failing of Christians usually is to forget God altogether, right? Just to be gliding along in all that's good. But no, when things are good we should give God thanksgiving and praise and thank Him for every good gift comes from Him. But when things are difficult, and they are often difficult, We should also remember this isn't by happenstance. This isn't by chance. I don't like it. I'm not sitting up here trying to pretend to be some great person that's like, I love when trial and tribulation comes because I know God's going to really chasten me and develop me in this. But you know what? I do realize that what the Word tells me over and over again is when that chastening comes, when those difficulties come, to think about them differently. to think about them with a renewed mind, to think about them as a people who realize God is working even through this for my good, for the church's good, for the good of his mission, for the good of the gospel, for the good of my family, for the good of my brothers and sisters in Christ. And if we have that big a view of God's providence, then we can do what he's saying here. And even through trials and tribulations, rather than griping we can give glory to God at all times because He's truly working all these things for our good and His glory.