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Discipline is hard. Accepting instruction is difficult. They both require us to delay our satisfaction. When we are in the middle of being corrected, it can feel threatening. Our flesh wants to resist becoming vulnerable. But in time, that correction will reap a great harvest. This is why wisdom and correction go hand-in-hand. The wise person understands the end result of discipline.
“I was stupid and didn’t understand; I was an unthinking animal toward You.”
Psalms 73:22 HCSB
The Bible often associates those who hate discipline with the animal kingdom. Animals are instinctual. They are territorial. Outside of divine intervention, they always do what benefits themselves in the short term.
“But one who hates (Pro 1:22) reproof stands outside the divine realm of sensible discourse and belongs to the animal kingdom (cf. Pro 9:3). Ignoramus [“senseless,” NIV] “refers to a stupid man who does not have the rationality that differentiates men from animals (Psa 73:22).”
New International Commentary
How can it be that someone would actually look forward to discipline? To the wise, discipline is not just a place to see your own wrongdoing, it is a place to experience insight. It is a place where we can experience the divine hand of God making real changes in our lives.
“The man who loves instruction is a man who has a true estimate of what is top priority and what is really of superior value. That means that he will listen to instruction. However, I must say that after getting folk to listen to the Word of God, one of the great problems is getting them to obey what it says. Obedience is absolutely essential.”
J. Vernon McGee