Chastisement

[Job 5:17] Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth: therefore despise not thou the chastening of the Almighty:
[Behold - Eliphaz concludes his discourse, with giving Job a comfortable hope, if he humbled himself before G-d.
Happy - Heb. Blessedness’s (various and great happiness) belong to that man whom G-d rebukes. The reason is plain, because afflictions are pledges of G-d's love, which no man can buy too dear; and are necessary to purge out sin, and thereby to prevent endless and eternal miseries. Without respect to this, the plan could not be true. And therefore it plainly shows, that good men in those ancient times, had the belief, and hope of everlasting blessedness.
Not that the actual suffering is joyous; but the consideration of the righteousness of Him who sends it, and the end for which it is sent, make it a cause for thankfulness, not for complaints, such as Job had uttered (Heb 12:11). Eliphaz implies that the end in this case is to call back Job from the particular sin of which he takes for granted that Job is guilty. Paul seems to allude to this passage in Heb 12:5; so James 1:1; Prov. 3:12. Eliphaz does not give due prominence to this truth, but rather to Job's sin. It is Elihu alone (32:1-37:24) who fully dwells upon the truth, that affliction is mercy and justice in disguise, for the good of the sufferer.
We have had fathers of our flesh, who corrected us for their pleasure, or according to their whim, and we were subject to them: how much more should we be subject to the Father of Heaven, and live? For He corrects that we may be partakers of His holiness, in order that we may be rendered fit for His glory.
Despise not - Reverence the chastening of G-d:
1. Let grace conquer the hostility which nature has to suffering, and reconcile yourself to the will of G-d in it. We need the rod and we deserve it; and therefore we ought not to think it either strange or hard if we feel the smart of it. Let not the heart rise against a bitter pill or potion, when it is prescribed for our good.
2. Do not think ill of it; do not put it from you (as that which is either hurtful or at least not useful, which there is not occasion for nor advantage by) only because for the present it is not joyous, but grievous. We must never scorn to bend down to G-d, nor think it a thing below us to come under His discipline, but reckon, that G-d really magnifies man when He thus visits and tries him.
3. Do not overlook and disregard it, as if it was only a chance, and the production of second causes, but take great notice of it as the voice of G-d and a messenger from heaven. More is implied than is expressed: Reverence the chastening of G-d; have a humble awful regard to this correcting hand, and tremble when the lion roars, Amos 3:8. Submit to the chastening, and study to answer the call, to answer the end of it, and then you reverence it. When G-d by an affliction draws upon us for some of the effects He has entrusted us with, must honour His bill by accepting it, and subscribing it, resigning Him His own when He calls for it.
The Almighty - Who is able to support and comfort you in your troubles, and deliver you out of them: and also to add more calamities to them, if you are stubborn and persistent.
Eliphaz, in this concluding paragraph of his discourse, gives Job what he himself knew not how to take, a comfortable prospect of the issue of his afflictions. If he did but recovers his temper and accommodate himself to them.]
[18] For he maketh sore, and bindeth up: he woundeth, and his hands make whole.
[For he – G-d's usual method is, first to humble, and then to exalt. And He never makes a wound too great, too deep for His own cure.
Bindeth up - (Deut. 32:39; Hosea 6:1; 1 Sam. 2:6), an image from binding up a wound. The healing art consisted much at that time in external applications.
1. The nature and property of it would be altered. Though it looked like a man's misery, it would really be his bliss: Happy is the man whom G-d correcteth if he makes but a due improvement of the correction. A good man is happy though he is afflicted, for, whatever he has lost; he has not lost his enjoyment of G-d nor his title to heaven. He is happy because he is afflicted; correction is an evidence of his son-ship and a means of his sanctification; it mortifies his corruptions, weans his heart from the world, draws him nearer to G-d, brings him to his Bible, brings him to his knees, and so is working for him, a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. Happy therefore is the man whom God correcteth, James 1:12.
2. The issue and consequence of it would be very good.
3. Though he makes sore the body with sore boils, the mind with sad thoughts, yet He binds up, as the skilful tender surgeon binds up the wounds he had occasion to make with his incision-knife. G-d binds up by the consolations of His Spirit, which oftentimes abound most as afflictions do abound, and counterbalance them, to the unspeakable satisfaction of the patient sufferers.
4. Though he wounds, yet His hands make whole in due time; as He supports His people, and makes them easy under their afflictions, so in due time He delivers them, and makes a way for them to escape. All is well again; and He comforts them according to the time wherein he afflicted them. G-d's usual method is first allow to wound and then to heal, first to convince and then to comfort, first to humble and then to exalt. G-d tears the wicked and goes away; let those heal that will, if they can (Hosea 5:14); but the humble and repentant may say, He has torn and He will heal us, Hosea 6:1.]
Have you felt the like you have or are being chastised? Are you seeing it in a different light? Are you learning from the lesson or does it need to be repeated?