Because He Loves You
I greet you in Jesus’s precious name! It is Monday morning, 15th August, the year 2022, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today.
If we start off in the Book of Job:
“Behold, happy is the man whom God corrects;
Therefore do not despise the chastening of the Almighty.”Job 5:17
Do not despise the discipline of the Almighty... Then we go to Hebrews:
“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.”
Hebrews 12:11
You know the good news is that chastisement or discipline is not forever! Why does God chastise us if He loves us, why does He punish us if He loves us? Well, it is for that very reason - He does not want us to hurt ourselves through disobedience. Just like the mother who tells her little child to stand still at the stop street while the cars are passing by and the little child is disobedient and does not listen to his mother. He runs across the road and a passing car nearly runs him over. What does the frantic mother do when she runs across the road and picks up her little child? She gives the disobedient child a really good spanking because of the sheer relief that her baby nearly died but has been miraculously spared. It's for the love of her child that she openly does it and she could not care who is watching.
Sometimes God does not answer our prayers in the way which we asked because He knows that it would not be good for us. When I was a young farmer, on a Sunday afternoon - I will never forget it, I took a young minister, a pastor, for a ride in the pick-up. He said to me: “You know Angus, all my life I used to pray. I used to ask God to give me a farm of my own but He never answered my prayers and I would get so disappointed. But now I realize why I never received that farm, because if God had given me that farm I would have forgotten Him. I would have got so involved with the farm that I would have forgotten all about the Lord.”
I want to say to some young lady who is so disappointed because her relationship with her boyfriend has not come to anything - Don’t be disappointed. The Lord has got a special man for you. I want to say to that young man who really wanted an opportunity to play that professional sport but the door never opened - Don’t be disappointed, God knows what is good for you. Just trust the Lord because He loves you.
Jesus bless you and have a wonderful day.