All chastening seemeth for the present to be not joyous but grievous; yet afterward it yieldeth peaceable fruit unto them that have been exercised thereby, even the fruit of righteousness.
Verse 11. Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous. It does not impart pleasure, nor is this its design. All chastisement is intended to produce pain, and the Christian is as sensitive to pain as others. His religion does not blunt his sensibilities, and make him a stoic, but it rather increases his susceptibility to suffering.
joyous . . . grievous--Greek, "matter of joy . . . matter of grief." The objection that chastening is grievous is here anticipated and answered. It only seems so to those being chastened, whose judgments are confused by the present pain. Its ultimate fruit amply compensates for any temporary pam. The real object of the fathers in chastening is not that they find pleasure in the children's pain.
Our apostle in these words seems to obviate an objection against a compliance with his exhortation to bear divine chastenings with silence and submission; and this is taken from the trouble and sorrow wherewith chastisement is accompanied; this he takes for granted is so, but takes off all the weight of the objection, by opposing the benefits of affliction thereunto. Learn hence, 1.