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Wednesday, February 3, 2021

God’s Discipline


The WORD today reminds me that God disciplines his children.

Discipline usually has a strong connotation. In school, the discipline office is not somewhere you would want to be sent. The discipline officers are not the people you would want to get your attention. Discipline has sometimes been associated with finding fault, but the first reading today tells us otherwise.

God disciplines those whom he loves. Discipline is God’s way of strengthening us and making us more like him.

Discipline should be looked at from a different perspective. It is not finding fault, but an act of love. True love disciplines, not to hurt, but to improve. One should not lose hope or feel bad when being disciplined, or undergoing challenges, but rather stay strong and focus on the God, and look forward to the result when we overcome the challenges and discipline.

Discipline brings strength.

Challenges in life can either make us or break us. If we give up, we will be broken. But if we endure, if we remain focused on God, we will emerge stronger and better. God has his wisdom for allowing things to happen, and he has his purpose, so we should not waste our energy to think about it, or to complain or question Him, but rather trust in God and remain in Him as we endure the challenges and discipline he brings.

In the gospel, we see Jesus experiencing the challenges of faithless people. He did not give up or get frustrated, but remained focused on the task God has for him. And the psalmist reminds us that God’s kindness is everlasting to those who fear him. May we be inspired by these reminders.

How do I view discipline? Do I feel that God disciplines me? As his child, do I feel that there are hardships and challenges? Do I blame him or do I just trust in him and stay focused on doing what is right? Do I realize that there are blessings as I overcome these challenges? 

May we see God’s discipline in a new light, and be faithful and trust in him and his process to make us more like him. 

Father God,
Thank you for today. Thank you for another day to live. Thank you for another chance to love and serve you. Thank you for the reminder that you want me to endure and improve through your disciplining me. Lord, help me be faithful and focused on you as I experience challenges. I know you have a purpose and everything will be for my good. I trust in you as I endure the challenges. Amen.

Blessed Day!

In Christ,
-g-

Ps
See related reflection:

February 03, 2021
Wednesday of Week 4; St. Blase

FIRST READING

Brothers and sisters: In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood. You have also forgotten the exhortation addressed to you as children:
My son, do not disdain the discipline of the Lord or lose heart when reproved by him; for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines; he scourges every son he acknowledges.
Endure your trials as “discipline”; God treats you as his sons. For what Ason” is there whom his father does not discipline? At the time, all discipline seems a cause not for joy but for pain, yet later it brings the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who are trained by it. 

So strengthen your drooping hands and your weak knees. Make straight paths for your feet, that what is lame may not be dislocated but healed. 

Strive for peace with everyone, and for that holiness without which no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one be deprived of the grace of God, that no bitter root spring up and cause trouble, through which many may become defiled.

RESPONSORIAL PSALM

R. (see 17) The Lord’s kindness is everlasting to those who fear him. 

Bless the LORD, O my soul; and all my being, bless his holy name. Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. 

R. The Lord’s kindness is everlasting to those who fear him. 

As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him, For he knows how we are formed; he remembers that we are dust. 

R. The Lord’s kindness is everlasting to those who fear him. 

But the kindness of the LORD is from eternity to eternity toward those who fear him, And his justice toward children’s children among those who keep his covenant. 

R. The Lord’s kindness is everlasting to those who fear him.

ALLELUIA

R. Alleluia, alleluia. 

My sheep hear my voice, says the Lord; I know them, and they follow me. 

R. Alleluia, alleluia.

GOSPEL

Jesus departed from there and came to his native place, accompanied by his disciples. When the sabbath came he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished. They said, “Where did this man get all this? What kind of wisdom has been given him? What mighty deeds are wrought by his hands! Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joseph and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his native place and among his own kin and in his own house.” So he was not able to perform any mighty deed there, apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them. He was amazed at their lack of faith

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