The Truth About Grace
By Charles C. Cook

Chapter 3
—Grace and Discipline—

With all the beautiful things that may be said about Grace, there must not be omitted another word if there is to be a proper understanding of the subject, viz.: that Grace is perfectly consistent with discipline, for “Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth” (Heb. 12:6).

There they are together these two words, “loveth,” “chasteneth,” and the two others “scourgeth,” “son,” and let it be remembered that scourging means drawing blood. What God hath joined together let no man put asunder however contrary it may be to the desires and preconceptions of the human heart.

The bestowment of Grace then does not mean that the children of God are to be pampered and petted, shielded from every rough wind, and gently carried over all the hard places. It is next to criminal to rear children in this way, as thousands of instances in these modern days amply show, resulting as it does in a useless and often a vicious life for them. The heavenly Father will not make that mistake. He loves His sons and daughters and wishes them to be strong, robust and beautiful, but to have them so requires their attendance in the rough school of trial,—the gymnasium of Discipline. Nor is experience here an elective branch of study, but the most important one in the curriculum; in fact it is the basis of all learning in the Christian life, for Discipline includes all trial, suffering and disappointment that comes to the believer, in brief everything that is contrary to his own natural choosing.

The administration of Discipline has for its aim at least three objects. The first of these is—

Correction. The child of God upon whom His favor is lavished is often ungrateful, thoughtless, weak and even sinful, and when these are the conditions the same hand that extended grace will now seize the rod and will appropriately apply it too, according to Hebrews 12:9, “Furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?” and I Cor. 11:31, 32, “For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world.” Here we are informed why we are chastened, it is because we do not judge ourselves. We become lenient and loose with self, and this necessitates the divine judgment and chastening. In the 30th verse the apostle even says that because of their unworthy eating of the Lord’s Supper many among the Corinthians were weak and sickly (ill), and that some slept (had died). Some people have very easy notions concerning sin and seem to have the idea that God thinks as little of their sins as they do. Ah no, sin in the sight of God is a serious thing and will be dealt with in due time, for He is a faithful Father, who will not be held back by any false considerations. In administering correction He is not afraid of offending His children, nor of losing their esteem, a motive that controls many foolish parents, in their failure to punish when it is deserved. On the other hand God’s wisdom guarantees against mistakes in applying the rod, while a heart of love guides His conduct.

But correction does not by any means fulfill the entire purpose of Discipline, the—
Purification of the recipients of Grace is another purpose of its administration. Many need to learn this, for their thoughts go no further than the idea that God is punishing them for some transgression, whenever they realize that discipline has come upon them. But this is not the universal key at all. It is rather often found that God is endeavoring to clear the dross from the character of the child whom He has especially selected as an exhibit of spiritual excellence. All Christians have more or less dross that must be refined away, and it seems that the higher the grade of Christian character the more attention does God give to its purification. “The fining pot is for silver, but the furnace (where the fire is even more intense) is for gold.” Those three choice ones Shadrach, Meschech and Abednego, whose lives seemed well nigh blameless, must go into a furnace heated seven times hotter than was wont. That fiery trial was allowed by God in order to test them, as well as to demonstrate their strength and purity. How it pleased God to see them shining for Him in the furnace like refined, burnished gold! This is the explanation of Job’s suffering; it was not penal as his three friends tried to force him to believe with their long platitudinous addresses, but remedial and purifying.

In the shop of some large diamond dealer will be seen great machinery and much power, and all brought to bear on what seems to be but a small piece of glass. One might be sure of the value of that transparent morsel if he would but look around and see what skill, labor and expense are being devoted to it. Let this be remembered when the believer is on God’s wheel that cuts and polishes.

A faithful Christian lay on his dying bed. To his minister he said, “Why do I suffer so? Is this punishment?”

For reply the minister told of a visit he had paid to a great flower show at Mannheim on the upper Rhine, where were displayed millions of flowers in endless profusion of color, fragrance and beauty, and that among them all the gems of beauty, the most highly prized, were the Alpine flowers, the children of winter and the storm, and these were perfected in their beauty by the struggle with stern and savage nature. The dying man took in the thought and grew in submission to the “good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

Very applicable is the following selection, which has been of greatest blessing to thousands: “If God has called you to be really like Jesus in all your spirit, He will draw you into a life of crucifixion and humility, and put on you such demands of obedience, that He will not allow you to follow other Christians, and in many ways He will seem to let other good people do things which He will not let you do. Other Christians and ministers who seem very religious and useful, may push themselves, pull wires, and work schemes to carry out their plans, but you cannot do it; and if you attempt it, you will meet with such failure and rebuke from the Lord as to make you sorely penitent. Others can brag on themselves, on their work, on their success, on their writings, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any such thing, and if you begin it, He will lead you into some deep mortification that will make you despise yourself and all your good works. Others will be allowed to succeed in making money, or having a legacy left to them, or in having luxuries, but it is likely God will keep you poor, because He wants you to have something far better than gold, and that is a helpless dependence on Him, that He may have the privilege of supplying your needs day by day out of an unseen treasury. The Lord will let others be honored, and put forward, and keep you hid away in obscurity, because He wants to produce some choice, fragrant fruit for His coming glory, which can only be produced in the shade. He will let others be great, but keep you small. He will let others do a work for Him, and get the credit for it, but he will make you work and toil on without knowing how much you are doing; and then to make your work still more precious, He will let others get the credit for the work which you have done, and this will make your reward ten times greater when Jesus comes. The Holy Spirit will put a strict watch over you, with a jealous love, and will rebuke you for little words and feelings or for wasting your time, which other Christians never seem distressed over. So make up your mind that God is an infinite Sovereign, and has a right to do as He pleases with His own, and He will not explain to you a thousand things which may puzzle your reason in His dealings with you. He will take you at your word; and if you absolutely sell yourself to be His slave, He will wrap you up in a jealous love, and let other people say and do many things that you cannot do or say. Settle it forever, that you are to deal directly with the Holy Spirit, and that He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue, or chaining your hand, or closing your eyes, in ways that He does not deal with others. Now when you are so possessed with the living God that you are, in your secret heart, pleased and delighted over this peculiar, personal, private, jealous guardianship and management of the Holy Spirit over your life, you will have found the vestibule of heaven.”

But how slow we are to see it, that discipline is for our purification, and therefore for our higher success. The Apostle expresses it in these words, “For I think that God hath set forth us the apostles last, as it were appointed to death: for we are made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men.”

If even an ordinary salesman takes delight in an opportunity to show samples of his goods in order to further the interest of the house he represents, how much more should the Christian desire to do so. His samples are patience, forbearance, sincerity, benevolence, charity, humility, etc., etc.; but none of these can be shown except under trial and discipline.

The Christian then should hail these conditions as opportunities for showing his wares, but alas, how often is he off his guard and instead of showing these attractive qualities and by so doing representing his Master, he is impatient, fretful, mean, proud, resentful and uncharitable. As well might a salesman hope to succeed by taking from his case or trunk to show his customer damaged articles,—a broken vase, a worn out shoe, a battered hat, etc.

The third purpose in the administration of divine Discipline is the—
Preparation of the believer for his place in God’s Plan. It is suggested by that illuminating reference to our Lord’s sufferings found in Hebrews 2:10, “For it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.” This to be sure does not mean that our Lord’s character was made perfect through suffering, for this would mean that he was imperfect or sinful before, which no one entertains for a moment. He has always been perfect in holiness. No, the meaning is that by His sufferings He was wholly fitted to become the Saviour of men. There was a completeness, a filling up of all that was necessary to His work as a Saviour to consummate God’s plan. As has been shown in the paragraphs under Purification, we are made morally better by afflictions if we receive them in the right manner, for we are sinful and need to be purified in the furnace of affliction; Christ was not made better, for He was before perfectly holy, but He was completely endowed for the work which He came to do by his sorrows. He was rendered thus complete because His sufferings, in all the forms that flesh is liable to, made Him an example to all His people who shall pass through trials. They have before them a perfect model to show them how to bear affliction as they move forward to the accomplishment of God’s design for their lives. While in none of our sufferings can we parallel the work of Christ, for we can never make atonement for others as He did, yet there is this for us in His example, that as He through suffering fulfilled the Father’s plan for His life, becoming obedient unto death, so may we by the spirit of thorough submission to God’s will fulfill his thought for us and accomplish his purpose. This is the Royal Road to Divine preferment as is given in Heb. 12:1, 2, “Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Appropriate also is Phil. 2:5-11, “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” In I Peter 5:6 is the principle condensed into two brief sentences: “Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time:” and “He giveth grace to the humble.” While in I Peter 5:5 we have the same thought in the following words of strength and beauty. “Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble.”