I recently had the scare of my life, which ended up with me deactivating my Facebook account for a while. I have walked with the Lord for a fairly long time now, about 13 and a half years. During that time, I have felt His anger over my mistakes several times, especially at the start of my walk when I was just discovering what sin was and where the boundaries were. He would always spiritually give me a tangible ‘sensation’ of His displeasure, akin to like when you were a child and you had done something very wrong, and the experience of your parent or teacher finding out and then calling you out, and then the moment of knowing that you are now ‘in hot water’. In fact, that metaphor is a perfect description, for there is a sort of ‘hot panic’ in one’s reaction to the chastising, that also has a hot sense of shame to it (which is why children will boldfaced lie to one’s face to try to get out of it, for it’s always very unpleasant to be in this situation). You must know what I’m talking about, right? If not, you were way better than me, for I was always up to mischief and often in some sort of trouble during my youth, and so I have a lot of experience with this dreaded feeling of ‘being in trouble’.

However, this time was different. At least, it felt different, for once I felt His wrath on me this time, I felt I had done something that was irreparable. To give a rough nutshell of what happened for context, a new sister in the Lord didn’t like my views to do with women and authority in the church, and sent me a message with a video to watch, along with her own rebuke. By this time, I had had a relentlessly long unbroken few months of hard work at my job, working all sorts of long hours, and that evening after another long day, I had sadly lost my usual patience and instead took offence to her message, which lead to a sort of aggravated ‘tit for tat’ conversation in which my frustration only grew, eventually leading to me (sort of) lashing out, which (to be honest) is very unlike me. Truly, the devil chooses the moments we are at our weakest to orchestrate his intended chaos, I can certainly testify that first hand! Anyway, this lady said that she had felt inspired by the Spirit to contact me over this, and (rightly) called me out for pride and arrogance during the discussion, which I naughtily dismissed in my annoyance with the whole issue, instead casting the blame of pride back on her, totally believing I was right to do so at the time. This was when the Lord’s meltingly furious anger poured into my spirit, a feeling I have experienced from Him several times in my life, but never THIS strong. To try to describe it, it felt like I imagine it would feel to hear the Lord say ‘Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels’, which of course produced HUGE anxiety in me, immediately thinking I had blasphemed His Spirit! Of course, I repented immediately, but the weight of the event was on me yet for days, leading me to where we are now as I write this blog.

Let’s get one thing straight before I carry on writing. Days later, after much soul searching and prayer, I’ve realised that this was in fact a severe chastisement from the Father, not the unforgivable sin (as the devil would want me to believe), and that I still very much have a hope in the cross of Jesus. I have to confess that my attitude had been completely rotten, and my response to this dear sister was exactly the opposite to what the Spirit had intended for me to have, which was to patiently and lovingly explain my position to her on the subject she had brought up about women and authority in the church (which to this day I believe is the biblical one). My disobedience and fleshly interaction with her had then caused the Spirit of the Lord to rebuke me in the strongest way I’ve ever felt yet, and (of course) He was totally right to do so. I had negated what He had wanted to produce in both of us because of my unrighteous reaction to her message, and He (thankfully) didn’t hold back in letting me know what He thought about that! I had also burned bridges that He had instead wanted to build between His children, which is completely out of line with the will of Jesus as He prayed in John 17, about unity and being one as He and the Father are one. In retrospect, this was also reprehensible, and definitely part of the rebuke.

The definition of chastisement is that of ‘a severe criticism, a rebuke or a strong reprimand’. It can also mean corporal punishment, like a smacking or beating. In my soul’s searching and seeking truth after all this happened, I was looking up passages in the bible on this very word. Let me now share part of Hebrews 12 with you, for even though I knew I had completely overstepped the mark with the Lord and that He was rightfully very angry with me, this passage has given me great joy and much hope! Let’s read these merciful and graceful words together; take your time over them:

“And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of Him. For whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live? For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but He for our profit, that we might be partakers of His holiness. Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby. Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees; And make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be turned out of the way; but let it rather be healed.”

Here are some wonderful truths. To be a son or daughter of the most High God is to often face chastisement, for none of us are perfect in spite of our desires to want to be holy and be like Jesus, and therefore we will all often need correction, sometimes severely, in order to continually forsake the darkness that tempts us (which we sadly all naturally-speaking prefer, rather than the way of light) and be guided by His wrath to then repentantly set foot on the right path again. It’s a biblical fact that the Lord uses His righteous anger with us over our sins in order to guide us towards Himself, by His Spirit. Sometimes (as I’ve discovered) His rebukes are so strong, one might actually want to ‘faint’ (I can testify to it), but we are encouraged in Hebrews 12 to actually be encouraged by it, for it means we are truly His children whenever this happens. In fact, it seems that the time to worry is when it never happens to you! His chastisement is actually another expression of His great love and mercy, and so weirdly, it is to be desired. To be ignored by the Lord is the greatest cause for concern; do not be tempted to think that no news is good news. A hardened heart is too dull to sense spiritual displeasure over sin, and this is the worst place to be. All of us are prone to doing works of evil, especially when we are physically or emotionally weak, for the strongest temptations come at those times. The point is that none of us are exempt from doing works of iniquity, and therefore from time to time we must all expect rebukes from the Lord of righteousness, as He trains us to seek for and desire PURE holiness in our lives.

Chastisement feels awful when one goes through it, but when done righteously it always produces the good fruit of a refined soul that is a blessing to others, and not a curse. Those who were not disciplined as children oftentimes grow up to be spoiled brats, and in the extreme, even maturing into what the world would call ‘narcissists’. They tend to be unteachable, and hardened against personal improvement due to an inability to see themselves from other’s point of view; also being unable to see out of their own human experience and put themselves in someone else’s shoes for a while. The Lord does not want this for His children, for He wants soft, teachable, humble and contrite souls who recognise when they do evil, and who are also quick to repent, for everyone’s sake. That is why the act of chastisement is an expression of His love, for He is looking into our futures and refining us in the moment in a furnace to purify us, at the expense of us experiencing pain or discomfort, perhaps even the sense of abandonment for a while by Him, in order for us to grow and mature as believers and disciples.

I have learned a lot over the last few days since this all happened. I confess that I never really understood the use the Lord has for chastising His children until now, which is why I want to write a blog about it as I feel the whole church could benefit greatly from the lesson I had to go through. So often from the pulpits we hear solely of the Lord’s great love for us that makes us feel warm, secure and cosy, and yet we neglect the fact that BECAUSE He loves us, He will sternly rebuke us for our iniquity until we truly repent and follow His ways. In fact there is a solemn warning in the scripture I quoted above, that if you aren’t being treated as such by Him, then you are either already perfect, or you don’t know Him at all; the second is far more likely, let’s face reality. I actually recommend praying often for His chastisement, for although it’s very unpleasant at the time, it comes with HUGE spiritual benefits in the long run, not least a deepening of that healthy fear of the Lord that we all so desperately need. Secondly, I’ve learned that even doing something desperately wicked (in ignorance at least) is (only?) met with a stern rebuke by the Lord, rather than what we actually deserve, which is eternal damnation.This is truly an amazing fact. It truly enthrals me to think that the Lord’s patience with me or any of us is just SO long suffering; not that I intend to abuse His patience at ALL, but instead that I know myself and my wicked ways all too well to know that this probably won’t be the last time He is mad with me, and yet there is still an enormous amount of grace that comes with one’s rebellion, that I now have further recognised to the glory of God. This gives me even greater respect for the Lord, if that were even possible!

If and when you find yourself in this position I was in recently, don’t despair, or ‘faint’; rather, pray, study and seek Him. And secretly rejoice in the fact that He loves you enough to reveal what He thinks of your behaviour before you would’ve found out on Judgement day, for the present means there is a future you can repent into; on that great and terrible day, repentance will not be possible. Praise Him for His mercy!