for example—takes you aside and says, “You know, I’ve been watching the way you relate to others and have observed a pattern in your life that really concerns me. Can we talk about it?” Doesn’t it give you warm fuzzies to know that someone cares enough about you to risk confronting you? Doesn’t it make you want to say, “Oh, yes, tell me more!”? Or does it rub your fur the wrong way?
If someone is trying to bring truth or admonition to your life and you resist it, then you are like an illegitimate child and not a son or daughter, at least in heart attitude. Inability to receive discipline can be a sign of an orphan heart. Orphan hearts have an independent spirit and resist admonition and correction. Whereas, sons and daughters welcome these things, even when they seem unpleasant. They know these parts of discipline are a crucial part of the process of nurture and growth to maturity. More importantly, they embrace discipline as proof that they are favored children of a caring Father.
Recently, some of my closest friends and board members at Shiloh Place Ministries sat down with me and said, “Jack, there is a relational pattern in your life that really concerns us.”
Reluctantly, and a little apprehensively, I replied, “I probably need to hear more.” This was significant because for nearly 50 years I
didn’t
want to hear it. My orphan mind-set was not open to constructive criticism and correction. After I received the sonship revelation, however, I began welcoming corrective admonition because I knew it would help me learn to think and act like a son.
The “concern” my friends and colleagues shared with me was a heavy one, and my first thought was defensive,
Wait a minute! You do the same thing! And you’re teaming up two-to-one on me?
But then I remembered this Scripture from Hebrews that says if I cannot receive discipline—if I struggle against receiving admonition and correction in my life—then I am like an illegitimate child and not a son.
The Greek word for
illegitimate
literally means, “bastard.” When we refuse to receive discipline, admonition, or correction, we isolate a part of our heart from other people, including God. In effect, we become fatherless. We either live our life as if we have a home, or we live our life as if we don’t have a home. We live life valuing admonition, or we reject it and take on an orphan heart.
Kinder than the word
bastard
is the phrase “spiritual orphan.” A spiritual orphan is a person who feels that he or she does not have a home or a safe and secure place in a father’s heart where he or she feels loved, accepted, protected, affirmed, nurtured, and disciplined.
Hebrews 12:9 brings us to the issue of our mission:
“Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live?”
(NAS). When we are subject to the “Father of spirits,” life flows. The Greek word for
subject
literally means “dependent” and “underneath.” Furthermore, the words subject,
subjection
, and
submission
are all interchangeable in Greek. I like to paraphrase the last part of this verse to say, “Be subject to Father’s mission and live.” Be in submission to, get underneath, and be dependent uponFather’s mission … and life begins to flow in our emotions and relationships.
But what is the opposite? Be subject to your own mission—self-protection, independence, self-reliance, not opening your heart to love or to the possibility of being hurt again—and death comes. Paul’s words in Romans bear this out:
For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God
(Romans 8:6-8 NAS).
To be subject to our own mission is to be led by our flesh, which
If someone is trying to bring truth or admonition to your life and you resist it, then you are like an illegitimate child and not a son or daughter, at least in heart attitude. Inability to receive discipline can be a sign of an orphan heart. Orphan hearts have an independent spirit and resist admonition and correction. Whereas, sons and daughters welcome these things, even when they seem unpleasant. They know these parts of discipline are a crucial part of the process of nurture and growth to maturity. More importantly, they embrace discipline as proof that they are favored children of a caring Father.
Recently, some of my closest friends and board members at Shiloh Place Ministries sat down with me and said, “Jack, there is a relational pattern in your life that really concerns us.”
Reluctantly, and a little apprehensively, I replied, “I probably need to hear more.” This was significant because for nearly 50 years I
didn’t
want to hear it. My orphan mind-set was not open to constructive criticism and correction. After I received the sonship revelation, however, I began welcoming corrective admonition because I knew it would help me learn to think and act like a son.
The “concern” my friends and colleagues shared with me was a heavy one, and my first thought was defensive,
Wait a minute! You do the same thing! And you’re teaming up two-to-one on me?
But then I remembered this Scripture from Hebrews that says if I cannot receive discipline—if I struggle against receiving admonition and correction in my life—then I am like an illegitimate child and not a son.
The Greek word for
illegitimate
literally means, “bastard.” When we refuse to receive discipline, admonition, or correction, we isolate a part of our heart from other people, including God. In effect, we become fatherless. We either live our life as if we have a home, or we live our life as if we don’t have a home. We live life valuing admonition, or we reject it and take on an orphan heart.
Kinder than the word
bastard
is the phrase “spiritual orphan.” A spiritual orphan is a person who feels that he or she does not have a home or a safe and secure place in a father’s heart where he or she feels loved, accepted, protected, affirmed, nurtured, and disciplined.
Hebrews 12:9 brings us to the issue of our mission:
“Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live?”
(NAS). When we are subject to the “Father of spirits,” life flows. The Greek word for
subject
literally means “dependent” and “underneath.” Furthermore, the words subject,
subjection
, and
submission
are all interchangeable in Greek. I like to paraphrase the last part of this verse to say, “Be subject to Father’s mission and live.” Be in submission to, get underneath, and be dependent uponFather’s mission … and life begins to flow in our emotions and relationships.
But what is the opposite? Be subject to your own mission—self-protection, independence, self-reliance, not opening your heart to love or to the possibility of being hurt again—and death comes. Paul’s words in Romans bear this out:
For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God
(Romans 8:6-8 NAS).
To be subject to our own mission is to be led by our flesh, which
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