“Step into my office” are words no employee wants to hear. Like being called to the principal’s office or worse, hearing your father sternly say, “We need to talk,” they’re moments that instantly put a pit in your stomach. Even when deserved, no one enjoys receiving correction. But the question is, how do you respond to it?
During my police career I served as a motor officer (a traffic cop on a motorcycle) for several years. My entire day, every workday, was to alter driving behavior by issuing citations. Like the examples above, I was aware of the dread experienced by drivers that saw my lights flashing in their mirror. Because I knew that meeting me was going to have a negative impact on their day, my goal was to be as professional as possible without the appearance of condescension. I tried to deliver the “correction” in a way that was clear (a ticket was coming), but with empathy (it wasn’t personal).
Over thousands of interactions I’m convinced I saw every possible reaction to that correction. I watched grown men weep and women scream at the top of their lungs. I’ve been offered gifts and threatened with lawsuits. My clipboard has been thrown across a car and tickets crumpled up and thrown on the ground. (Bear in mind that every one of these reactions was the result of being held accountable for a simple driving infraction.)
Consider first how much greater our offenses are against God. Second, think about how you respond to His legitimate correction. We know that all Christians continue to sin.
For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. (Rom. 7:18–20)
We also know that “the Lord disciplines the one He loves and chastises every son whom He receives” (Heb. 12:6). Let me repeat that—if God loves you, He will discipline you. God is “most loving, gracious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin” (2LBCF 1689, 2:1), yet in that love He corrects you. The Israelites were subjected to God’s discipline during the wilderness wandering and their response (for 40 years!) can be summed up in a word—complaining.
The Bible even acknowledges that no one likes to be corrected, but it also explains why He does it. “For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it” (Heb. 12:11). Despite its unpleasantness, correction produces a harvest of righteousness. Knowing the outcome will benefit you and bring glory to God should affect your attitude about receiving it. it won’t make it enjoyable, but it can help you accept it with humility.
The alternative is to play the victim by weeping or react in anger by shouting (even if only internally). You can make promises to God that you know you will not keep or (in essence) threaten Him by withholding prayer, Bible study, church attendance or offerings. You can throw a tantrum or spend 40 years complaining about it. Be warned, however, because God says, “Whoever hates reproof will die” (Prov. 15:10). And again, “At the end of your life you groan, when your flesh and body are consumed, and you say, ‘How I hated discipline, and my heart despised reproof! I did not listen to the voice of my teachers of incline my ear to my instructors. I am at the brink of utter ruin in the assembled congregation’” (Prov. 5:11-14).
Choose to view the Lord’s correction with gratefulness. Humbly acknowledge your need for discipline and God’s right to administer it. Thank God that He loves you enough to reprove you and look forward to the righteousness it will produce.
Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. (Rom. 5:3–5)