It's been too long...

I was rereading some correspondence from a dear friend and wanted to share his wisdom. These thoughts are not my own, but were extremely helpful to me...

I remember an old preacher saying, "The Lord is the only one who can humble us without humiliating us." (His name was T. E. Wilson). I think he got it right.

The purpose of humiliating someone is to cause them personal grief, and, perhaps for the one who does the humiliating, to feel superior. But the purpose of God's humbling is to get us going in the right direction and to accomplish His purposes in and through us.

The Scripture is clear. Whatever God does in our lives, He does it for our good (not merely for His glory). I profited from reading the first part of Heb. 12 again.

* our fathers chastened us and we respected them (even though they often did it for their benefit, not ours); if so, we ought also to respect our heavenly Father, rather than despising His chastening or fainting under it BECAUSE He always does it for OUR profit.

I also appreciated WHAT that profit is. In Romans 8:28-29, the good to which "all things" contribute is our conformity to Christ. But here is is "that we might be partakers of His holiness." In other words, that we might share His abhorrence of sin and its damages.

Hmmm.