After sinning I often flinch, expecting God’s backhanded slap, but it hardly ever happens, and rarely the way I anticipate. For this reason I began to search out how and why God actually does discipline me.

          It seems good to distinguish the hardships of discipline from other types of hardships in the Bible. God gives us trials to grow us spiritually, like the hardships of Job, which developed perseverance and faith.¹ God’s hardships can come from his promise that we will reap what we sow, like his resistance towards the proud; or like a lazy harvester will be in want during winter.² God gives punishments to warn others, like the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, or sending a destroying angel to the Israelites, after David leaned on his own strength, by counting his troops.³ And lastly God disciplines us to turn us back to obedience, like when God sent serpents among the Israelites for grumbling, or when Satan sifted Peter like wheat, for believing he could do something apart from God.⁴ These types of hardships often overlap, like reaping what we sow, might be used to discipline us. I just wanted to establish that not all hardships are God’s discipline.

          To understand God’s discipline we need to know that it’s different than giving us what we deserve. Neither Hell nor earthly justice are discipline. Discipline is not meant to bring justice, or pay someone back.⁵ A good parent doesn’t discipline out of anger, or to take revenge, but out of love, to correct bad behavior.⁶ Jesus bore all of our punishment and God’s wrath on the cross, so discipline is not God’s way of venting his anger.⁷ The main reason I believe God disciplines us, is to give us motivation to change. The reason God want’s to change us, is quite freeing, its because he loves us.⁸

          Before talking about God’s love, I want to talk about his forgiveness. When I understood forgiveness, I was able to see that anger had nothing to do with the hardships of his discipline.⁹ When God forgives, it means he no longer requires a punishment.¹⁰ If I truly forgive someone, I am giving up my right to make things even or take revenge. God will punish every sin.¹¹ He tells us to forgive everyone, and trust him to make things right.¹² Just like Jesus took the punishment for our sins, God wants us to trust him to punish those who sinned against us. In the parable about the debts, Jesus commanded his disciples to forgive the debts or sins of others, because God no longer holds us accountable to pay back the massive debt that we owe him, referring to our sins.¹³ Because Jesus paid for our sins on the cross, we no longer owe God anything.¹⁴ If God were to punish believers for sins, it would be like saying Jesus blood wasn’t enough.

          The scripture says God disciplines out of love.¹⁵ Love doesn’t want the worst for someone, but the best.¹⁶ Love covers over a multitude of sins.¹⁷ Because God loved us, he chose not to punish us, but to take the punishment himself.¹⁸ Although we will not fully comprehend his love until heaven, he did create some ways for us to better understand it.²¹

          When we are in a romantic relationship, we want the other person to reciprocate our love, so we will work through any offenses that hinder that relationship, as fast as possible. We don’t wish the worst for the other person when they insult us, but rather we want the least amount of consequences necessary to correct the issue between us. Another example is the love of a parent for a child. A parent that truly loves his child, doesn’t want the worst possible consequence for bad behavior, they want the minimal consequence necessary to correct it. This seems like a good time to mention that discipline is not always necessary. God often warns us, without giving us consequences for our sin.²² In the same way, a parent won’t punish a child, if he just needs a warning.

          God’s love is a consuming love, it’s part of his nature.²³ God is love.²⁰ His love is a necessary key to understand why he forgives us; and why his discipline is not a form of vengeance or justice, but rather the minimal thing needed to turn us back into his arms, into a relationship with him.²⁴

          A romance where the other person walks away, or a child that rebels against his parent is not what they want. In these cases the relationship is broken, although both the lover and the parent still want it to be mended. When we sin, we are breaking our relationship with God, and choosing to walk away from him. He still loves us and wants to restore the relationship, but like the one who walked away, or the child who rebelled, unless we turn from our sins the relationship cannot be fixed. Restoration is what God wants, and his love is so great that he is willing to go through immense pain to fix what we wrecked. His love didn’t end when he died on the cross for us, his love is a consuming fire, it remains just as intense.²⁵ He is not interested in giving us what we deserve, or making us feel the pain we dealt to him. Jesus already paid for that, he just wants to restore our relationship with him again.²⁶

① James 1:2-4 / Job 2:3 ② 1 Peter 5:5 ③ 2 Peter 2:6 / 1 Chronicles 21:1-14 ④ Numbers 21:5-9 / Luke 22:31-34 ⑤ Psalm 103:10 ⑥ 2 Samuel 14:14 / Hebrews 12:6 / Hebrews 12:10-13⑦ Isaiah 53:10 / Romans 5:9 ⑧ Hebrews 12:6-13 / James 4:8 / Romans 5:8 ⑨ Romans 5:9 ⑩ Psalm 103:12 ⑪ Revelation 20:11-15 ⑫ Matthew 6:15 / Romans 12:19 ⑬ Matthew 18:21-35 ⑭ Psalm 32:1 / Isaiah 1:18 ⑮ Hebrews 12:3 ⑯ 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 ⑰ 1 Peter 4:8 ⑱ John 3:16 ⑳ 1 John 4:16-19㉑ Ephesians 3:18-19 ㉒ Psalm 130:3–4 ㉓ Song of Solomon 8:6㉔ Ezekiel 18:31-32 ㉕ Romans 8:31 ㉖ Ezekiel 18:31-32 / Luke 15:11-32 / 2 Samuel 14:14