DEVOTION//Creative destruction

[Our earthly fathers] disciplined us for a little while, according to what seemed best to them, but God disciplines us for our good, so that we may have a share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant when it is happening, but painful, yet later it yields a peaceful harvest of righteousness for those who have been trained by it (Hebrews 12:10, 11).

Creative destruction

Sears, the 20th Century's retail giant, has collapsed into bankruptcy. The foundation of the retail world has shifted toward online shopping. Sears and a growing avalanche of brick and mortal stores are being swallowed by this tectonic shift. Count Eastman Kodak, J.C. Penney, and US Steel among those buried.

Economist Joseph Schumpeter once observed, “Creative destruction is the essential fact about capitalism.” Sears is a victim of this creative destruction as American capitalism reinvents and improves itself.

God, at times, uses something like that principle of "creative destruction," not to improve national economies but to improve our relationship with him. In his wisdom and love, he allows treasured parts of our lives to collapse.

Discipline, nurture, chastisement

Recently, my optometrist diagnosed glaucoma in my left eye and predicted cataract surgery in both eyes in the coming years. That was not welcomed news for me, a reader, writer, and photographer. For you, that creative destruction might be weakened hearing, job loss, separation from a loved one.

But "God disciplines us for our good, so that we may have a share in his holiness." (The word for "discipline" can also be translated "nurture" and "chastisement.") God's discipline is his "creative destruction." He takes away good things so we have room for better things.   

God works good

Yes, losing what we value is upsetting. "No discipline seems pleasant when it is happening, but painful," the writer of Hebrews admits. But the Father who sacrificed his Son to make us his children guarantees he will always rebuild, reconstitute, reconstruct, recreate after destruction.

Romans 8:1 assures that "there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." Because of Jesus we have a rock-solid, dearly-loved relationship with God that cannot change. Which is why verse 28 can promise, "In all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose."

A harvest of righteousness

That is why we can be sure his discipline, his nurture, his chastisement always "yields a peaceful harvest of righteousness for those who have been trained by it."

So celebrate glaucoma, job loss, loneliness. Your Father is using creative destruction to produce "a peaceful harvest of righteousness."