“Before I was afflicted, I went astray, but now I keep Your word.” Psalm 119:67

Lessons Along the Way

Afflicted – No one likes chastisement.  No one enjoys correction.  No one loves discipline.  No one except the man or woman who wants to be closer to God.

David’s son, Solomon, tells us in Proverbs that the wise man accepts correction and reproof because he knows that it is the way of life.  It is the fool who throws aside discipline and chastisement.  Wise people know the purpose of affliction.  Fools simply complain.

It helps a bit to expand our understanding of this Hebrew word, anah.  In Exodus 10:3 it means, “to be humbled”.  In Genesis 15:13 it’s about oppression.  Once it is used about the self-affliction of fasting (Ezra 8:21).  And then there is the quintessential passage, Isaiah 53:4, the Suffering Servant of the Lord.  Even Jesus knew something very personal about this word.  If it applies to him, why wouldn’t it apply to us?

“Before” says David.  Before I felt humiliation from God.  Before I knew His oppression.  Before I experienced His chastisement.  Before God stepped into my life to correct it, I was on the wrong road.  I took the detours.  I found the exits.  I traveled the back alleys.  It took humbling to bring me back to the straight path.  For most of us, it usually does.  Human beings have bad compasses.  They rarely point to true North because we are always brushing up alongside some other magnetic attraction.  Left alone, we veer away.

Why does the wise person embrace reproof and affliction?  Not simply for course correction.  Affliction is positive confirmation of God’s intervention and care.  Those who never experience humbling are the most tragic creatures of this world.  God has abandoned them to their own directions.  When God loves us so much that He makes the effort to straighten our bent ways, we can be sure that we are not alone.  Affliction is never abandonment.  It is affirmation.