Hebrews Chapter Twelve, Sanctification Is Profitable

 

Hebrews 12:10 For they indeed for a few days chastened us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness.

 

Verse 10 continues to contrast human fathers to our Heavenly Father. They are similar in the sense that both, as our parents (in flesh or in spirit) discipline us with wisdom. For human fathers, this wisdom is limited, sometimes flawed or misdirected.

The author states that such fathers discipline their sons for, “a few days.” Also, they do so as, “seemed best.” God will be our Father forever, and His wisdom is perfect, Jude 25, 1 Timothy 1:17. Human fathers possess wisdom acquired from experience, or received as a blessing from Heaven. But this wisdom is woefully limited, and suffers the tyranny of the sin nature’s assault upon it. Despite that, human fathers chasten as seems best, or as the situation, coupled with their understanding, permits. And this they do for but a few days. Why? Well time means quite little looking through the lens of eternity. A child becomes a man soon enough, and a human father’s work is soon accomplished in that sphere. Finally, we die and enter eternity to be with our Heavenly Father, and all former human relationships dissolve. We know that formerly married partners will no longer be so, Matthew 22:30, Mark 12:25. We may assert then that parent/child relations also dissolve, since we are all one in Christ, Galatians 3:28.

 

While human relationships dissolve, our relationship with the Father will endure throughout eternity. We are His children through the second birth. We are born first by water in the likeness of our human father; then we are born a second time, by the Spirit, in the likeness of our Heavenly Father, John 3:5. And this Father chastens, not as seems best to Him, but for our profit. We gain from correction. The ultimate end of this gain would be to become partakers of God’s holiness. Holiness is a virtue or characteristic entirely unique to God’s person. Humanity exhibits love, wisdom, etc. It is part of being made in God’s image. But holiness is alien to human experience. Holiness is seperatedness from anything profane. It is complete detachment from all that defiles; holiness defines the nature and actions of the true God as He governs the earth and its peoples. Holiness is an adoptive quality, given to us by our Heavenly Father.

 

It is written, “But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption—that, as it is written, “He who glories, let him glory in the Lord,” 1 Corinthians 1:30, 31. We are clothed by Christ when we are saved; one might say that we are clothed in Christ, given an imputed nature not originally our own. When the Father looks on us, He sees His Son, and knows that we are, “accepted in the Beloved,” Ephesians 1:6. In summary, God alone is holy, and so if the saints desire holiness, we must become partakers of the One who is holy. This is God’s end for His children. Human fathers lead and teach for a time, but God forever, and for our good, if we are willing to be taught by the lesson of chastisement.