Discipline and Mistakes

Discipline = Love. The pastor talked about what you learn while in the woodshed. There were so many good references and good laughs that he made when he talked about going to the woodshed, I don't know how to share them though, one of those you'd have to be there things. He did say that one thing he never believed as a child was when his father said to him before his whippings, "This is going to hurt me a lot more than it's going to hurt you." He didn't believe it until he had to whip his own daughter. I know as a child discipline doesn't seem to be anything but mean, but it's done with a lot of love and caring, and to always follow through with it only deepens the true meaning behind it. You need to be taught wrong from right, and nice, soft words don't always do it, your attention has to be gotten, you need to have something to mark the moment so you'll remember. This coming from me, yeah, I know, I never was spanked as a child, as some may know. I'm so sensitive though, all it really took for me was to know my daddy was disappointed in me and I was heaving in sobs and pain. A lot of people think of guilt as something to hide away and not show and to even try to never feel. Who wants to feel bad when they can just say, eh, well, I'm not perfect. Guilt shows you have a conscience, guilt shows you care, guilt shows you have feelings. We are of the flesh, we are not perfect, we make mistakes every day, no, guilt shouldn't weigh us down completely, but it is important to have guilt, it shows that you're aware of when you've done wrong. And God will forgive you, just ask. A lot of people are so judgmental though, and they make you suffer more if you share your guilt when they should be encouraging you, forgiving you, and helping you get through it. An example of how harsh it can be that he gave was he read a story of a young girl who sent a boy friend some nude or nude-ish pictures of herself with her cell phone. He ended up passing these around to everyone and everyone made her feel so awful with guilt and shame that she ended up taking her own life. She made a mistake. Big enough to have to feel that way? Big enough she shouldn't have been allowed to move on? We all make mistakes. People can say she should have thought about this and that before she did so and so, people can twist and turn it around a million different ways, but the truth is we have all made mistakes that other people could say the same things about, whether or not it could be turned into such a scandalous and huge deal to the ones around us. A lot of the mistakes we make are made on impulse, without thinking first. And then you know as well as I do some big ones are made even when we do think about it first. How dare we ever judge others for their sins and make them feel worse for it. "So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, he that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her." -John 8:7

This hymn was sung before departing, it struck with me deeply.

My Lord, I Did Not Choose You

My Lord, I did not choose You,
For that could never be;
My heart would still refuse You,
Had You not chosen me.
You took the sin that stained me,
You cleansed me, made me new;
Of old You have ordained me,
That I should live in You.

Unless Your grace had called me
And taught my op’ning mind,
The world would have enthralled me,
To heav’nly glories blind.
My heart knows none above You;
For Your rich grace I thirst;
I know that if I love You,
You must have loved me first.

Here is a link with music to it...

http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/m/l/mlidncyo.htm

-ladyworpledinker