HEBREWS XII. 6-8

"Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure (continue patient and acquiescent under) chastening (child discipline), God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastise--- rent (child discipline), whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons."

CHASTISEMENT as above referred to, and as spoken of in the Bible, is of two kinds---reformatory punishment for sin---and disciplinary "trials of faith." The design of each is one and the same, and, therefore, not to be despised, nor fainted under, their common intent being "for our profit, that we may be partakers of His (God's) holiness." From the fact that all believers are subject to conscious chastening of one or the other kind, it is inferred that no believers ever attain to a state of freedom from conscious sin---that is, that in no case under the trial does "patience have her perfect work, and the subject become perfect and entire, wanting nothing." In regard to such an idea, we remark:--

1. The case of the earthly parent cited by the apostle proves the exact opposite to what this inference affirms. The earthly parent does induce obedience in the child, when the latter offends, and does so as occasion requires, by the rod. The rod, however, when properly applied, induces a state of obedience in which "scourging" is no more needed. Such was the experience of the sacred writer under divine chastisement. "Before I was afflicted," he says, "I went astray: but now have I kept Thy word." Chastisement, as "scourging" even, is no evidence at all of the perpetuity of conscious sin, unless the former is perpetual. Chastisement in no form is, in the case of believers, perpetual and uninterrupted, and therefore is, in itself, no proof whatever of the fact that they are always in disobedience.

2. It is a most servile and dishonourable view of the genuine Christian character and life, that we should regard ourselves as "bastards and not Sons," unless we are continually bleeding under the rod of rebuke and correction. To those who have such an experience as that, the language of our Father is "Why should ye be stricken any more? ye will (or rather will ye) revolt more and more?" The result of the rod in genuine Christian experience is thus represented by the Psalmist: "Surely I have behaved and quieted myself as a child that is weaned from his mother: my soul is even as a weaned child." The true parent, our Father above especially, does not scourge his child after chastisement has brought him into such a state as that. There is not in all that the Scriptures have said in respect to the discipline of the rod, on the one hand, and of affliction on the other, the shadow of a foundation for the dogma of the continued disobedience of all believers in Jesus.

3. The habit, we remark once more, of regarding all afflictive providences, scourgings for sin, and of always expecting to sin and be scourged therefor, the idea which induced the inference that such providences are of this character, tends to annihilate every sentiment of filial love, patience, and quietude in the heart. It is for this reason that so many Christians seem to lose almost all consciousness of God's parental love, and to regard Him as a heartless master, continuously holding over them, and driving them to their duties by, the rod and the lash. Nor will they ever come into such relations to Him, that the spontaneous outgoings of their hearts toward him will be, "My Father, my Father, Thou art the guide of my youth," as long as they continue to expect always to sin, and always to be beaten for the same.