Just like most people, I like to do what I want to do and don’t want to be told differently. Having a 4 year old and a 2 year old, I understand this tendency all too well. I’m working through Proverbs and Proverbs 10:17 says,

Whoever heeds discipline shows the way to life, but whoever ignores correction leads others astray.

When you submit to God as your Father, you have someone leading your life who is completely unhindered when it comes to his point of view. You also have someone in charge of your soul who could not love you more than he already does. You also have the security of knowing that your Heavenly Father has all the power in the universe to carry out his will.

Most people seem to imagine that God agrees with them most of the time. This is a woefully inflated view of our own perspective and an astoundingly limited view of God’s perspective. Isaiah 55:9 says, “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” This is God letting us know that he thinks in a realm that we can’t comprehend. This means that we should submit to his loving discipline in our lives.

For anyone who has ever experienced God’s discipline, you know that it doesn’t generally feel good. God is a great doctor and he is performing an ongoing operation on our hearts. I’ve heard it said before that “God loves us exactly as we are but too much to let us stay that way.”

I have to be honest and say that I don’t like God’s correction. I don’t like it when I’m wrong. I don’t like that I still have a long way to go. The more that we recognize that we are still works in progress however, the more quickly we’ll grow in our relationship with God.

Where is God calling you to grow? Where is there some tension between who you are now and who God is calling you to be? What does submission look like in this area?