🧠 Hebrews 12:11 | Original Greek & Athletic Training

📧In today’s email…

• 🧐 Insights from the original Greek

• 🧠 Wisdom from the weight room

• 📚️ Resources to help you connect further with Hebrews 12:11

🧠Memorize

_{see if you know what words go in the blanks}

___ ___ moment ___ __________ _____ painful rather ____ ________,

but later __ yields the ________ _____ of righteousness to those who have been trained __ __.

Hebrews 12:11

🗣️ Insights From the Original Greek

Funny enough, the book of Hebrews was written in Greek (not Hebrew or Aramaic).

Let’s look at two key words in our memory verse this week to more fully understand what it’s saying:

What we read as “discipline” is the word paideia, which refers to the idea of “instruction or correction that aims at increasing virtue”

The word translated as “trained” is gymnazō. It means to exercise vigorously.

So if I had to simplify those definitions, I’d say:

• discipline = correction

• training = preparation

Through loving discipline and training, God wants to transform us into the people He created us to be.

While God initiates this, we’re invited to participate in it!

Here are a few points the writer of Hebrews is making:

• Nobody likes being disciplined in the moment. 🙅 

  • The default operating system of the world around us can be boiled down to this:

    • Seek pleasure

    • Avoid pain

  • Look no further than Jesus and you’ll see that this is not biblical.

• Discipline gives you access to power beyond what you’re capable of right now.

  • The word gymnazō looks like the word for gymnasium because this literally refers to an athlete engaging in vigorous exercise.

    • When God uses discipline, it’s similar to an athlete training.

    • It’s not pleasant in the moment, but there is a higher purpose for the training.

    • The purpose is to:

      • Bear fruit (make you more Christlike in character), and to

      • Increase your capacity to trust God.

Wisdom From the Wight Room 💪 

When I first started lifting weights, I could barely curl 30 pound dumbbells.

But the beautiful thing was that I could lift 20 pound dumbbells.

Then 25 pound dumbbells.

And over the course of a few weeks, I increased my capacity to lift heavier weights until I could curl 30 pound weights.

This is the essence of weight training.

You do something that is unpleasant for the moment, but expands your capacity for more in the future.

Discipline is a way to access power that we aren’t currently able to access.

In the same way, God’s discipline and training corrects and prepares us to have more capacity to do His will in the future.

So when you find yourself in an uncomfortable or unpleasant situation where you are faced with a choice to obey God, remind yourself:

This is an opportunity! 💡 

It’s an opportunity to:

• Trust God in the midst of hardship

• Do His will even if it makes your life harder

• Build your obedience muscles to strengthen them for whatever God has for you in the future

Look For Chances to Do The Hard Thing 👀 

Throughout your day today, look for 1 opportunity to obey God in a small way that is outside of your comfort zone.

Examples:

• 🫂 Admitting fault in an argument with a friend or spouse

• 🗣️ Sharing your faith with someone instead of staying quiet

• 🙏 Choosing to pray for someone instead of complaining about them

Tomorrow, we’ll dig into how the concepts in Hebrews 12:11 show up in other parts of Scripture and practical ways to strengthen your ability to trust God.

Recommended Resources 🎙️

Here are a few resources to help you dig deeper into this week’s passage and topics:

• 📹️ Bible Project: Overview of Hebrews (link)

• 📚️ Better: A Bible Study of Hebrews by Jen Wilkin (link)

• 📚️ The Spirit of the Disciplines by Dallas Willard (link)

• 📚️ The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry by John Mark Comer (link)

• 🎵 How Deep The Father’s Love by Worship Initiative and Shane & Shane (Listen on Spotify | Listen on Apple Music)

Answer key ✅

For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant,

but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

Hebrews 12:11