There are many aspects of God’s ways that are opposite to the world’s ways. In fact, I call God’s kingdom “the upside-down kingdom” because, as He said,

Isaiah 55:8-9 NLT
[8] “My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the Lord. “And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. [9] For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.”

Take, for example, Jesus’ teaching on leadership. Worldly leaders, in the main, say, “Do as I tell you!” Jesus’ way is “Do as I show you.”

John 13:13-15 NLT
[13] “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and you are right, because that’s what I am. [14] And since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other’s feet. [15] I have given you an example to follow. Do as I have done to you.”

Who is the greatest?

Mark 9:35 NLT
[35] He sat down, called the twelve disciples over to him, and said, “Whoever wants to be first must take last place and be the servant of everyone else.”

As always, Jesus Himself set the example.

Mark 10:45 NLT
[45] “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

One of the great “upside-down” lessons of Scripture is God’s way of teaching us. Unfortunately, we often miss the point and fail to learn the lesson because we don’t recognise that God’s way of imparting understanding to us is different from ours.

Instead of learning and moving on, we stick at the same place, sometimes blaming God for our troubles rather than being grateful for new understanding…and we fail to move on in our journey to the Father.

Years ago, I prayed David’s prayer, little realising what a profound and far-reaching prayer it was.

Psalms 86:11 NIV
[11] “Teach me your way, Lord, that I may rely on your faithfulness (or, alternatively, “walk in your truth”); give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name.”

Seventeen years later, God is still revealing His way, and I am still learning!

So, what’s His way of teaching us?

Every child is obliged to go to school to be “educated” in a variety of disciplines, ever increasing as knowledge increases.

Daniel 12:4 NLT
[4] “But you, Daniel, keep this prophecy a secret; seal up the book until the time of the end, when many will rush here and there, and knowledge will increase.”

Are we in that time now?

Our world is advancing in knowledge so fast that education for the young offers a bewildering array of facts to be stuffed into each small brain. When the lessons are taught and, hopefully learned, each child must go through the gruelling ordeal of regurgitating their knowledge on paper as best they know how. This happens not once but many times over in a period of twelve, now thirteen years, since they are now obliged to start their formal education a year earlier. “Big school” begins with and adds another year, Grade R.

However, God’s method of training works differently. He has no desire to stuff our heads with facts. His objective is to prepare us for eternity in His presence, not just as “saved” people but as sons and daughters in His forever family who perfectly resemble His Son!

The task He has undertaken is enormous. He requires us to learn to live new lives, leaving behind both sin and the old sin nature that controlled us and to become increasingly like Jesus.

God has given us His Holy Spirit to help us put to death the deeds of our old nature. He has given us His own nature through which we learn to nurture our new nature by submitting to and obeying Him. He has also given us everything we need to accomplish His objective.

2 Peter 1:3-4 NIV
[3] “His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. [4] Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.”

He wants us to trust His perfect love for us in every…yes, every circumstance, good or bad, as He works IN ALL THINGS for our good.

Romans 8:28-29 NLT
[28]”And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them. [29] For God knew his people in advance, and he chose them to become like his Son, so that his Son would be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.”

To achieve His purpose, God has given us a textbook, the Bible, a resident teacher, the Holy Spirit, and an effective method of teaching/learning, experience. He knows that we learn best through trial and error. The Holy Spirit and the Word are the interpreters of experience, helping us to better understand the purpose of the test.

Someone once said, “Life is lived forward but understood backwards.” How true that is in God’s “school of life”!

God’s way of teaching, then, is first do the test, then learn the lesson. As back-to-front as this may seem, it’s an effective way to impart understanding and indelibly imprint experience. Learning theory may put facts in our heads but real life lessons are learned the hard way…if we pay attention and apply the lessons.

Hebrews explains God’s method. Since we are incurably stubborn, we must feel the experience first, then internalise the lesson. God has an impossibly high standard, and only His work in us can achieve the goal. Without His work, we will never know the rewards.

Philippians 2:12-13 NLT
[12] “Dear friends, you always followed my instructions when I was with you. And now that I am away, it is even more important. Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear. [13] For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.”

Now let’s examine His way of training us for eternity.

He calls it “Discipline!”

Hebrews 12:5-6 NLT
[5]” And have you forgotten the encouraging words God spoke to you as his children? He said, “My child, don’t make light of the Lord’s discipline, and don’t give up when he corrects you. [6] For the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes each one he accepts as his child.”

Disciples are those who accept and respond to discipline. Why do we need discipline? We all start our new lives like lumps of unformed clay, shapeless and full of impurities. If the clay is ever to become a useful and beautiful artlcle, it must submit to the potter’s skill.

As the potter works the clay, he must first prepare the lump by eliminating whatever interferes with the shape and form he has in mind. Patiently, he works until the clay is smooth and free from everything that would blemish his vessel.

Then the potter puts the clay on the wheel, applying pressure as the wheel turns. Under his fingers, a shape begins to emerge. Carefully he works, an indent here, a raised bit there, guiding and controlling the clay, its shape, its thickness, its final form until he is satisfied that the vessel before him matches the blueprint in his mind.

Then comes the most important finishing touches, glaze and firing the clay. Without these disciplines, the clay might easily collapse into a formless lump again.

Do you get the picture?

God has a blueprint for His people, Jesus, the perfect Son. Once again, Scripture presents Jesus as our perfect example, model and mentor. Through His Spirit, “Christ in us” is the only way the Father will ever achieve His goal.

Let’s examine the process.

Hebrews 2:10 NLT
[10] “God, for whom and through whom everything was made, chose to bring many children into glory. And it was only right that he should make Jesus, through his suffering, a perfect leader, fit to bring them into their salvation.”

Much as we hate the thought, God uses suffering to discipline us just as He perfected His Son through suffering.

Hebrews 5:8-9 NIV
[8] “Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered [9] and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him…”

Jesus learned the meaning and value of obedience as a human through suffering… not by trial and error as we do, but by being perfectly obedient to the Father’s will.

Peter beautifully explains how Jesus suffered.

1 Peter 2:19-24 NIV
[19] For it is commendable if someone bears up under the pain of unjust suffering because they are conscious of God. [20] But how is it to your credit if you receive a beating for doing wrong and endure it? But if you suffer for doing good and you endure it, this is commendable before God. [21] To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. [22] “He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.” [23] When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. [24] “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.”

Although all suffering is painful, the writer to the Hebrews refers to the specific suffering of the believers to whom he was writing…Jewish believers who were tempted to go back to Judaism because of the severe persecution they were enduring.

To them, the writer explains that their suffering, unjust though it was, proved that they were truly God’s children and that He was qualifying them for His presence by making them holy.

Hebrews 12:7-11 NLT
[7] “As you endure this divine discipline, remember that God is treating you as his own children. Whoever heard of a child who is never disciplined by its father? [8] If God doesn’t discipline you as he does all of his children, it means that you are illegitimate and are not really his children at all. [9] Since we respected our earthly fathers who disciplined us, shouldn’t we submit even more to the discipline of the Father of our spirits, and live forever? [10] For our earthly fathers disciplined us for a few years, doing the best they knew how. But God’s discipline is always good for us, so that we might share in his holiness. [11] No discipline is enjoyable while it is happening—it’s painful! But afterward there will be a peaceful harvest of right living for those who are trained in this way.”

Both Paul and this unnamed writer put suffering squarely in the hands of God, not as we often think, random acts of the devil “attacking us”! God calls us to trust Him first, the only way to learn the lesson.

Why would God allow or orchestrate our suffering? Peter clarifies this thought.

1 Peter 4:1-3 NLT
[1] “So then, since Christ suffered physical pain, you must arm yourselves with the same attitude he had, and be ready to suffer, too. For if you have suffered physically for Christ, you have finished with sin. [2] You won’t spend the rest of your lives chasing your own desires, but you will be anxious to do the will of God. [3] You have had enough in the past of the evil things that godless people enjoy—their immorality and lust, their feasting and drunkenness and wild parties, and their terrible worship of idols.”

Strange as it may seem, according to Peter, physical suffering for Jesus has a powerful way of changing our attitude to sin. Suffering brings us back to earth with a bump, making the fragile nature of our lives that much more real. When we are close to death for whatever reason, sin is much less relevant or attractive.

Does this mean that suffering for Jesus is the only method of discipline that purifies us? What if we are never called to suffer for Him?

Although suffering for Jesus is the special privilege of some, and not all suffer in this way, we are all called to suffer “with Him”. This means that, whatever the nature of our suffering, we share His attitude of trust, submission, and obedience to the Father rather than complaining, resisting, and blaming the devil, “taking authority over him in Jesus’ name!” (which is unbiblical, unauthorised, and nonsense).

In the end, every trial is designed to test one thing, our trust in the Father’s perfect love. Abraham’s final test gives us the clue.

Genesis 22:2, 12 NLT
[2] “Take your son, your only son—yes, Isaac, whom you love so much—and go to the land of Moriah. Go and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on one of the mountains, which I will show you.”…
[12] “Don’t lay a hand on the boy!” the angel said. “Do not hurt him in any way, for now I know that you TRULY FEAR GOD. You have not withheld from me even your son, your only son.”

Do I fear God? Do I trust Him enough to obey Him without question? Do I love Him enough to take His every word seriously? Will I do what He tells me no matter how much it hurts? Will I take up my cross and follow Jesus as my example and mentor no matter the cost? Yes or no?

The tests will continue relentlessly, not to determine whether we pass or fail but to achieve God’s purposes. We will do them repeatedly until we learn the lessons and become what He made us to be, replicas of His Son.