Being sports spectators gives us the advantage of being able to admire and appreciate the skills of athletes who have trained countless hours to excel. Watching the recent Summer Olympics, for example, we saw gymnasts performing an array of flips, tumbles, spins and other feats that would leave the rest of us with broken bones and torn muscles.
How do they become so accomplished in their various events? I think of the pro football player who was asked how the pregame practice had gone. “Practice?” the player asked in amazement. “We talkin’ about practice?” Yes, practice – lots of it – is how gifted athletes hone their talents to become champions.
However, there’s more to practice than just repetition. Even though it seems to have gone out of fashion in the minds of many, it’s discipline. It’s the determination and resolve to be unrelenting in the pursuit of excellence and mastery. It’s putting in countless hours repeating basic skills so they become second nature, executed without having to think about them.
Consider the virtuoso pianist who, decades after having begun playing, still spends time practicing the scales to maintain finger dexterity and strengthen muscle memory. Many of us marvel, wishing we could play the piano with such skill. But the truth is, which of us would be willing to discipline ourselves to invest the innumerable hours needed to become so skilled?
Most of us will never be championship athletes, celebrated musicians, or elite surgeons or scientists. But that doesn’t mean we can’t benefit from discipline in our lives. Somewhere along the line, discipline received a bad name. As if it’s some contagious disease no one wants to catch.
Discipline and punishment are often regarded as synonymous, but they’re very different. Punishment is designed to address wrongful behavior; discipline is intended to train and equip people to do what’s right.
These days many parents are reluctant or unwilling to discipline their children, thinking even toddlers have enough sense to recognize right from wrong. The fact is, they don’t. This is why Proverbs 22:6 admonishes, “Train [discipline] a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.” The role of parents is to love their children and provide for their needs, but also to discipline – correct them when they’re off course and train them in how to live, think and behave properly.
But discipline isn’t only for children. It’s something we all need and should embrace. The Scriptures explain it’s one of God’s primary means for guiding and shaping us. In Proverbs, one of the Old Testament’s wisdom books, discipline is often mentioned. One chapter, Proverbs 19, offers three significant references:
“Discipline your son while there is still hope…” (Proverbs 19:18). There may be a time when it’s too late for sound correction. Don’t wait until then.
“Listen to counsel and accept discipline, that you may be wise the rest of your days” (Proverbs 19:20). Rejecting well-intended discipline and godly counsel often leads to foolish decisions and regretful actions.
“Cease listening, my son, to discipline and you will stray from the words of knowledge” (Proverbs 19:27). Many a hard-headed individual has ignored discipline and correction and later had to face hard consequences.
Sometimes when we encounter adversity, we feel confused or angry. ‘Why is God doing this to me? Why’s He allowing this to happen?’ Before jumping to the conclusions that we’re being punished or that the Lord is mad at us for some reason, we need to consider what the Scriptures say about how He uses discipline in our lives:
“My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when He rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines the one He loves, and He chastens everyone He accepts as His son. Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as His children. For what children are not disciplined by their father? If you are not disciplined – and everyone undergoes discipline – then you are not legitimate, not true sons and daughters at all. Moreover, we have all had human fathers who…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. 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” (Hebrews 12:5-11).
Sometimes a parent will deny a child something he or she wants; other times the parent will insist that they do something they don’t want to do. “I’m doing this for your good. It’s because I love you,” the parent will say. At the time the child may think, ‘Yeah, right,’ only to realize later the parent in fact did it for his or her good. Sometimes the best demonstration of love is discipline.
God loves us far more than any parent could. He gave His one and only Son to die on a cross to redeem us from our sins (Romans 5:8). If that’s true, why shouldn’t we trust that when He disciplines us, it’s for our very best – part of His process for training and transforming us into the people He wants us to be.
And if we also desire to become who the Lord wants us to be, we must learn to discipline ourselves. There are many good ways of doing this, but one of the best is devoting consistent time to reading, studying, meditating on, memorizing and applying the Word of God. Like the professional athlete who practices until certain skills become second nature, we need to make the Scriptures central to our everyday lives so that over time they become second nature for our thinking and behavior.
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