I was catching up on my Wednesdays with Beth and guess what the first one out of the shoot was... How to deal with chastisement from God. One of the points she made was how God takes our consequences and makes them a teachable moment- that is chastisement. To supernaturally take over the consequences and use them to correct us for our profit and His glory.

Here is how I think I see it. We will all have things happen in our life and they are exactly that- things that happen. Divinely ordained, but happen from what seems out of nowhere from our perspective. We will have consequences of our decisions. If we are in Christ Jesus, the punishment is not ours. Yes, we will be chastised and corrected by God, and praise His name when we are. For it means He cares enough to make us more like Him. He does it because He loves us. We will not face the punishment though. Jesus has done that for us. However, if we are not in Christ Jesus, there will come a day when will have the punishment. A final day when we will no longer be teachable, be able to be corrected, when it will be too late. Breaks my heart to even fathom a day when it is too late. God, who is SO incredibly patient and kind and desiring for us all to repent, will draw the line at some point in time. That is what is weighing heavy on me today. For my family and the world.