I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my eye upon you. Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle, or it will not stay near you. (Psalm 32:8, 9 ESV)
As a kid growing up I had the type of parents who used their eyes to guide us as kids. I could be clear across the room doing something I shouldn't be doing when all of a sudden I would catch my mom or dad's "stink eye" which said, "Stop doing what you're doing or you will wish that you had." If I didn't take heed to their warnings I would be in big trouble.
As a parent, I learned that I could put the fear of God into my own children just by the look that I gave them.
David teaches us in this passage that we need to be so in tune with God that we would be guided by His eyes. With just a look toward His eyes we would know whether we were going the right way or not. We would know whether He was pleased with us or not.
This method is great as long as we are compliant and yielding but what happens when we are a little more stubborn and rebellious. Well, God turns up the pressure and delivers the "bit and bridal" method to our lives - a more unpleasant experience.
The bridal is put over the horses head but the bit was placed under their tongue to force the horses into submission.
Actually, there is a biblical process for bringing us all into submission to God's will. It's start gentle and moves to being more harsh depending on our response...
GOD'S METHODS OF DISCIPLINE
1. By His GRACE
For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, (Titus 2:11, 12 ESV)
2. By His WORD
But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. (2 Timothy 3:14-17 ESV)
For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. (Hebrews 4:12 ESV)
3. Through LEADERSHIP
Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you. (Hebrews 13:17 ESV)
I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. (2 Timothy 4:1, 2 ESV)
4. The Bit And The Bridle
I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my eye upon you. Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle, or it will not stay near you. (Psalm 32:8, 9 ESV)
5. Through The Rod Of Men
I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son. When he commits iniquity, I will discipline him with the rod of men, with the stripes of the sons of men, (2 Samuel 7:14 ESV)
An evil man seeks only rebellion, and a cruel messenger will be sent against him. (Proverbs 17:11 ESV)
6. Through Sickness And Pain
For God speaks in one way, and in two, though man does not perceive it. In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falls on men, while they slumber on their beds, then he opens the ears of men and terrifies them with warnings, that he may turn man aside from his deed and conceal pride from a man; he keeps back his soul from the pit, his life from perishing by the sword. (Job 33:14-18 ESV)
7. Open Humiliation
Deuteronomy 8
Notice what the scriptures say to us about heeding the discipline of The Lord...
If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land; but if you refuse and rebel, you shall be eaten by the sword; for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.” (Isaiah 1:19, 20 ESV)
Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers put me to the test and saw my works for forty years. Therefore I was provoked with that generation, and said, ‘They always go astray in their heart; they have not known my ways.’ As I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest.’” (Hebrews 3:7-11 ESV)
Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep your word. It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes. (Psalm 119:67, 71 ESV)
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