God’s Promises Include Blessings and Curses
When I hear the word promise I seldom, if ever, think of it in a negative context. The first part of Leviticus 26 was easy for me to read. It tells of the blessings that God will pour out on His people when they obey Him. Things like blessed crops and military success are the things every country wants to have. Yet, we cannot end our reading at the end of the blessings because God’s promise is not only for the good things in life. God continues His promise to Israel that if they refuse to walk in His ways, He will bring them plague, conquest, drought, and starvation. We don’t like to think of curses being a part of God’s promises, but today’s reading clearly shows that they are. This passage reminds us once again that God is just. He will not indulge our rebellious behaviors and attitudes for long.
Our home has long been a place where children gather. We joke that keeping track of who is here and who has left is like a party game. There are always people coming and going. While we enjoy being the place the neighborhood children gather, we have rules of behavior we expect to be followed. When someone breaks these rules, they are given a warning, usually two. However, if we have had to tell someone their behavior is unacceptable three times, we will ask them to leave. If the one breaking the rules is our child, discipline will follow. Any loving parent will tell you that disciplining your child is not an act of hatred, quite the opposite. If I did not care about the future of my children, I would not care to stop the bad behavior when it is small, or they are young. My daughter is in the terrible twos. It would be so much easier to just give in to her demands in order to keep the peace, but she will not remain two and small forever. I don’t want tantrums to continue into her threes – or worse yet into her adult life. To withhold discipline is actually the opposite of love because it harms the person much longer than correcting the bad behavior.
Hebrews 12:11 tells us, “For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant; later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.” God’s promises include both blessings and curses because ultimately God desires good things for His children. To allow us to continue in our rebellion is to allow us to continue to harm ourselves and others. We need to change the way we think about discipline. We need to understand that it, as well as good health and wealth, is a gift from God. God loves us too much to allow us to stay in our sins. He offers us a way to salvation and then trains us in the ways of righteousness. Training isn’t always pleasant. In fact, most of the time it is rather unpleasant until it becomes pleasant. The work is worth it. Our obedience to God is worth it. God’s promises are always for our benefit; whether they are for blessings or curses.
(Written by Keegan Harkins.)
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