Educating children often means refraining from being protective all the time. There are times when love must come in the form of limits, not freedom; in reprimands, not just hugs. Wise parents know that indulgent love does not always grow. So, when a father lets his child learn from mistakes, or a mother patiently directs a fallen child to get up, it is there that love finds its truest form, which is shaping, not just pleasing. And so it is with God. His instruction is not always comfortable, but it is always meaningful.

Psalm 94 gives voice to that experience, “Blessed is the man whom you educate, O LORD, and whom you teach your Torah. You will comfort him in the days of trouble." God's discipline is a process of deep inner formation. It is not punishment, but spiritual education that gives birth to wisdom. The philosopher Aristotle once said that virtue is the result of habits trained with discipline. This psalm echoes a similar sentiment: God trains our souls through life experiences, so that we do not merely know the truth, but become individuals who live in it. God's discipline, with all its accompanying challenges and wounds, is the foundation that restores human character.

When the psalmist says, "When I think, 'My feet have faltered,' Your steadfast love, O LORD, sustains me" (verse 18), we hear the voice of a soul learning to endure. This is where faith meets resilience, an inner resilience born not from self-strength, but from an awareness of God's sustaining love. Resilience does not mean never falling, but the ability to rise with new meaning. God's education teaches us that wounds are not the end, but the beginning of spiritual maturity. In every weariness and anxiety, God's love becomes a healing space where the soul is restored and redirected to the truth.

Friends of the Bible, ultimately, divine discipline is a forward-thinking form of love. Like a teacher who reprimands his student to find the right direction, God shapes us not to destroy, but to uphold. His discipline is a healing process that slowly, but surely, grows spiritual maturity. He turns suffering into soul training, and pain into an opportunity to know deeper love. So the psalmist is right, blessed are those whom the Lord chastens, for behind every rebuke is restoration, behind every struggle is maturity, and behind every wound is the hand of love that restores life.