The Kindness of the Lord's Discipline - Kevin Williams

Could you describe a time in which

the Lord disciplined you,

and you look back on that time

with utter thankfulness

for the fruit it yielded in your life?

Kevin: I mean, over the years,

as a Christian and a pastor,

there's been many times

where the Lord's disciplining you.

Whether it's for something
you're doing wrong

or whether it's just to help you
trust Him more and grow,

when you stand back later,

you look back and you can see

how the Lord's grown you.

The example that most comes to mind

is the first church I pastored.

I went in.

There weren't believers apart
from maybe a handful,

but I preached a sermon:

"You Must Be Born Again."

All hell broke loose.

They're saying, "We don't
have that talk in here."

They just wanted me out the door.

I was quickly out there,

but it was a major crisis and so forth.

They meant it for evil -
those who were doing it.

I'm not excusing them.

But I had so much pride in me at the time

and the Lord really just grounded me

to a powder in the whole experience.

But afterwards, I was
just so thankful for it.

And you start to realize as well,

things where you'd been overly harsh

with certain people,

or expecting too much

and things like that as well afterwards,

through seeing your own weaknesses too

in those situations.