Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted. In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons?

“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,
     nor be weary when reproved by him.
For the Lord disciplines the one he loves,
     and chastises every son whom he receives.”

It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but rather be healed.—Hebrews 12:1–13

Summary: My aim is to strengthen hearts of faith by observing that God disciplines those he loves.

Have you ever grown weary?

And lost heart?

Do you think you are at risk for growing weary and losing heart?

If we do not hear—really hear—the message of Hebrews 12, we will grow weary and lose heart.

Prayer
Father, help us see and embrace what you have for us in the text, and then discipline us in such a way as to reduce or eliminate the discipline that might otherwise be called for. Amen.

In preparing for this message, I had several kinds of individuals in mind:

1. The person whose dad was pretty much a negative—perhaps aloof, perhaps neglectful, perhaps abandoned you, perhaps harsh, abusive, injurious—and now you fear a Father’s Day sermon that will expect you to place your dad on a pedestal and rejoice in what a swell guy he was, when he didn’t seem like a swell guy to you. You dread the idea of being beat over the head with a Scripture club, exhorting you to honor your father (that rascal).
2. Dads who cringe at the possibility that here comes another Father’s Day message that will lay out the formula for being a great dad, a checklist that, if followed, will qualify you to escape the shame of being a failure, a catalog of fatherly requirements that will only serve to shine the spotlight on your failures, flaws, foibles, and limitations—not to mention your sins—a message that even if intended to equip you, ends up indicting you, a message that feels more like law-giving than life-giving.
3. Persons who wonder if they are permanently disabled and blocked from loving God the Father on account of the dysfunctional dad they had, so here comes a Father’s Day sermon to remind you that your family is broken, riddled with defects, and irretrievably maladjusted.
4. Those who strongly desire to be fathers, but aren’t. They may dread that here comes a sermon extolling the delights of being a dad, and so now they must feel all the more left out.

Well, those sermons are not the sermon I intend to give. What then? This: a sermon on the Fatherhood of God.

Fatherhood is a very important aspect of God’s identity. “Father” overlaps with King, but is not the same; overlaps with Lord, but is not the same.

Paul could have started each of his letters by pronouncing grace and peace from God our King, or God our Creator, or God our Judge, or God our Fortress, or God our Shepherd, but no, thirteen times Paul starts his epistles by making reference to the fatherhood of God.

To all those in Rome who are loved by God and called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.—Romans 1:7

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.—1 Corinthians 1:3

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.—2 Corinthians 1:2

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father….—Galatians 1:3–4

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.—Ephesians 1:2

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.—Philippians 1:2

To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae: Grace to you and peace from God our Father.—Colossians 1:2

Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, To the church of the Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace.—1 Thessalonians 1:1

Paul, Silvanus, and Timothy, To the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.—2 Thessalonians 1:1–2

To Timothy, my true child in the faith: Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.—1 Timothy 1:2

To Timothy, my beloved child: Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.—2 Timothy 1:2

To Titus, my true child in a common faith: Grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior.—Titus 1:4

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.—Philemon 1:3

Peter joins Paul in calling God “Father.”

Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who are elect exiles of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cap-padocia, Asia, and Bithynia, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father….—1 Peter 1:1–2

So does John:

That which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.—1 John 1:3

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.—John 1:14

Where do Paul, Peter, and John get all this father talk? They get it from Jesus himself:

Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name."—Matthew 6:9

Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet returned to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’“—John 20:16–17

This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God. So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise. [Lewis’ observation] For the Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing. And greater works than these will he show him, so that you may marvel. For as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whom he will. The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son, that all may honor the Son, just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.—John 5:18–23

As we see plainly in that text, when focusing on the Father, we dare not diminish the pre-eminence of the Son. In fact, the existence of the Son is what makes the Fatherhood of God a reality; no son, no father. The Son makes the Father a Father.

A word to offspring: There is a perfect dad, and he is not your mother’s mate.

Note: To say you cannot trust God as father because you have had a lousy earthly father image, betrays the fact that you do know the difference between a good father and a bad father. (Otherwise, you wouldn’t know yours was lousy.) Your earthly father is no standard. You can value God as a good Father. You know the difference.

To speak of God as Father is not to think of what our earthly fathers would do, and then conclude God is like them. No. He is the standard for fathers, and all earthly fathers measure up (or not) in accord with how they reflect him.

A word to dads: There is a perfect Father, and he is not you. For Christians, Father’s Day is not about placing human dads on pedestals. We do not honor dads by exaggerating their value. Nor by diminishing it. We honor them as God’s instruments.

Aware that he is the greatest Father, God sets himself to adopting many children. No one is owed adoption.

Not all persons are his children in the same sense. Yes, since we are all sons of Adam there is a kind of brotherhood across the entire human race, but, no, the Bible does not give us warrant for embracing something called “universalism,” which is the brotherhood of all without distinction.

The Fatherhood of God implies the brotherhood of all who are his children spiritually.

But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.—John 1:12–13

For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.—Romans 8:15–17

Jesus confirms:

Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.—Matthew 7:13–14

Brotherhood in that sense does not include the entire human race. Receive Jesus as Lord!

In what sense is God our Father? What does he do that is Fatherly?

Muslims reject the doctrine of the Fatherhood of God on the assumption that God does not cohabitate with women. They are right to say he does not cohabitate with women, but they are mistaken to conclude that cohabitation is the only means by which to produce offspring. Male and female contributions are the only means available to us, but God can simply speak a word, and that which does not exist comes into existence. The virgin Mary was indeed a virgin.

We are God’s children in the sense that:

1. He formed us (see Psalm 139). He provides all the physical material for our bodies and our sustenance. God provides our physical DNA—orchestrating all that is in the natural universe in order to bring you into existence, having selected your parents, your birth order, the specific egg and sperm that resulted in your particular frame, eye color, hair color, skin tone, basic intelligence, time in history, including your mother tongue, and more.
2. God is also Father in that we are his offspring (Acts 17:28); he has caused us to be born again.
3. By adoption—providing, protecting, granting an inheritance.
4. And there’s one other thing he does as Father, and it is the emphasis of today’s text: he disciplines his children.

Regarding the discipline in Hebrews 12, observe:

1. Discipline is good.
2. It’s not pleasant (at the time).
3. Generalization: Not everything that is good seems pleasant. And not everything that is pleasant may be good. The goodness of something is established on some other ground than “it makes me happy.”

The more easy and pain-free our lives have been, the less we will cherish the kind of spirituality taught in Hebrews 12. And the more we have suffered, the more we will cling to the precious teachings in this text—if we are willing to believe it.

Did you notice? His discipline comes from love and aims at a harvest of righteousness, sharing in his holiness, ending up in peace.

Will we accept the mystery of God’s providence in the pain of our lives, and be trained by it (as verse 11 says) for the sake of righteousness and peace and holiness and life—all of which are offered in this text?

It is normal for Christians to have experiences of adversity that don’t seem productive, threaten our faith and press too hard, or last too long and feel almost intolerable “so that we grow weary and lose heart.” The word “seems” —no discipline “seems” pleasant at the time—hints that there is a kind of delayed gratification to come later, but the tears and the sighs and the groans are right now and are so many that it looks like sorrow has the upper hand and that the eventual joy won’t be sufficient to make up for all the pain—at least it looks that way.

Let me insert this note for parents: If you’re trying too hard to make discipline pleasant, it’s probably not corrective discipline. “No discipline seems pleasant at the time” —that is, the consequence for naughtiness is and should be unpleasant, for that unpleasantness is what awakens the child to heed direction.

Delay of gratification is hard to endure.

Does anyone do it well?

Yes. Jesus. Let us fix our eyes on him.

The suffering of Jesus in Hebrews 12 is coming from the intentional hostility of sinful adversaries. And who’s in charge of that hostility? The main answer of the passage is that God is in charge here, and that he is in ultimate control of these afflictions and that they are in fact the loving discipline of a perfect heavenly Father. The main actions are God’s actions. That’s the burden of this passage. What adversaries do to us out of sinful hostility, God arranges out of loving, Fatherly discipline.

He is the ultimate doer here. He is not a passive observer in our lives while sinners and Satan beat us up. He rules over sinners and Satan, and as guilty as they are, they unwittingly fulfil his wise and loving purposes of discipline in our lives. This doctrine can be very hard to swallow; it requires faith. Some say that God is not in charge of the evil that happens to us. That he has given the world over to Satan and the free will of man. But it will not work in this passage. The hostility of sinners is real and it is wrong and they are responsible and guilty. But it is also—and this is a great hope for us—it is also the loving, painful discipline of our Father in heaven. God is not coming to his children late after the attack, and saying, “I can make this turn for good.” That is not discipline. That is repair.

It’s the difference between a concentration camp guard who makes you move that dirt pile over there…and then move it back; and the coach who tells you to run another set of wind sprints up that hill, because if you become conditioned to run with perseverance, there is a prize to be enjoyed for a long, long time.

Or, to borrow an analogy from John Piper, it’s the difference between the surgeon who plans the incision for our good, and the emergency room doctor who sews us up after a freak accident. This text says God is the doctor planning our surgery, not the doctor repairing our lacerations.

I am not commending passivity, as though when we suffer from the harshness of others we should make no appeals, or fail to call in the authorities. But if you cannot thank infinitely wise God for your inescapable adversities (including the imperfect dad he assigned to you, the dad who will always be your dad) you will not be grateful, but will harden yourself against God, and he will turn you over to the list of twisted perversions in Romans 1. Listen to this list: sinful desires, sexual impurity, shameful lusts, unnatural relations, inflammation, indecency, penalties of perversion, depraved minds, every kind of wickedness, evil, greed, depravity, envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice, gossip, slander, God-hating, insolence, arrogance, boastfulness, inventing ways of doing evil, disobedient to parents; senselessness, faithlessness, heartlessness, ruthlessness, not only continuing to do these very things but also approving of those who practice such things.

In today’s text, verse 9 poses this question: Will we “be subject to the Father of spirits, and live?” Or will we rebel against the Father of spirits, and shrivel up spiritually and die?

The text is wonderfully clear on this. Verse 6: “Those whom the Lord loves he disciplines.”

If you want his love, it comes with discipline.

If you are being disciplined, guess what? You are loved. You belong.

Every good father aims for the good of his children in disciplining them, but flawed dads practice flawed discipline with flawed aims. Not God. His four-fold aims are our good, our holiness, our righteousness, and our peace. And, he disciplines flawlessly.

The infinitely-wise God works everything for our good, including assigning to us the earthly dads we have.

God’s Fatherly love is such that when his children sin, he does not cease to love us, but is displeased with us and disciplines us. As Jesus says to the church at Laodicea, “Those whom I love, I reprove and chasten; so be zealous and repent.” There you have it: love and reproof are in the same sentence: Those whom I love, I reprove.

Application

1. Honor your earthly father (or his memory) not because he is perfect, but because the One who is perfect commands it, as though it would be healthy for you. Infinitely-wise God has given you just the flawed dad that his wisdom knew would be good for your sanctification.
• My own dad was definitely a flawed individual, but God assigned him as my dad, and I thank God that my dad married my mom, took me to church, led in family Bible reading, played catch, taught me that when he said no he meant no, openly admitted his personal struggles in sanctification, and more.
2. Throw off everything that hinders, and the sin that so easily entangles. Sin will take you where you do not want to go, keep you there longer than you want to stay, and charge you more than you want to pay.
3. Fix your eyes on the suffering Jesus—do much considering of him in his endurance.

If you are trusting in this Christ alone—Christ-crucified—Christ who endured the cross for the forgiveness of your sins and for the fulfillment of all God’s promises to you, including eternal life, then God is your Father. Happy. Father’s. Day!