Devotions for a Busy Business Person, no. 314 – The Healing Discipline

Most of us do not like discipline.

In business, discipline can sound like punishment. A missed target. A reprimand. A painful correction. A hard conversation. A budget cut. A failed plan that forces us back to first principles. 

“God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. Therefore, strengthen your feeble arms and weak knees.”
— Hebrews 12:10–12

Hebrews gives us a deeper picture. God’s discipline is not His anger taking something from us. It is His kindness strengthening something in us. God’s discipline is not random pain. It is forming grace. 

The Latin root of the word discipline means instruction or teaching. It belongs to the same family of words as disciple. In that sense, discipline is not merely correction. It is the training by which we are formed.

That does not mean it feels pleasant. “No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful.” Correction can expose our pride; it certainly has exposed my ego. Limits can reveal our impatience. Waiting can uncover our need for control. Failure can show us where our identity has become tangled in our performance.

Discipline comes in many forms. It comes through the Word of God, as shown above. But it may also come through friends, supporters, partners, and colleagues who love us enough to speak difficult truth.

Recently, we experienced this kind of discipline as we considered whether to proceed with the acquisition of a training centre in a part of the world where ReGen serves. At first, the opportunity seemed to align with many of our hopes: care for vulnerable people, practical training, land-based enterprise, and long-term sustainability. 

Yet as we listened carefully to supporters, partners, and colleagues, we received the instruction we needed. Their counsel helped us see the risks more clearly: possible mission drift, limits in our own capacity, the danger of taking on more than we were called to carry, and the need to protect the core work already entrusted to us. 

That discipline was not a rebuke, but a gift. Initially, of course, I felt disappointed. Their words were difficult to hear, but it was good counsel. Through their guidance, we were strengthened to make the harder and wiser decision not to proceed.

God’s discipline is not meant to leave us weakened, ashamed, or stuck. It is meant to strengthen our feeble arms and weak knees. It trains us, steadies us, and prepares us.

May you be strengthened through God’s discipline, receiving the harvest of peace.

Prayer

Father, help me to receive Your discipline as kindness, even when it is painful. Train me through correction, limits, disappointment, and delay. Strengthen what is weak in me, straighten what has become crooked, and produce in me a harvest of righteousness and peace. Amen.

Amen