"3 Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted. 4 In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. 5 And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons?
“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,
nor be weary when reproved by him.
6 For the Lord disciplines the one he loves,
and chastises every son whom he receives.”
7 It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? 8 If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons.9 Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? 10 For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. 11 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 12:3-11
The Apostle now proceeds to unfold the purpose and function of suffering in the Christian life. This is a remarkable passage, full of enlightenment and encouragement for hard-pressed believers. We should note two points in particular. The pressures that come upon Christians may certainly originate in Satan, but God permits this and uses it for His own ends. Satan may fire the arrow, but God intercepts it in mid-air and extracts the poison from the point, so that by the time it reaches us it is fraught with blessing. But a certain attitude to it now becomes all-important. We must realise that God is in it - hence the Apostle's excursus on the meaning of chastening. Secondly, the word translated 'chastening' could very accurately be rendered 'education'. This is very illuminating. God's sovereign grace transforms Satan's attacks into an education for His children! We might well entitle the chapter 'With Christ in the School of Suffering'. There is much here to think about. Sometimes children are difficult and fractious in school and will not learn their lessons, and teacher is obliged to 'keep them in' after school hours to go over the lesson again with them. And pupils have been known to be 'kept back' when the others go forward, to repeat a year. Do we not sometimes suffer more as Christians than we need to do, because of our slowness to learn the lessons God is teaching us? Does this throw any light on your problem?