4In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood. 5You have also forgotten the exhortation addressed to you as sons:

“My son, do not disdain the discipline of the Lord^b

or lose heart when reproved by him;

6for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines;

he scourges every son he acknowledges.”

7Endure your trials as “discipline”; God treats you as sons. For what “son” is there whom his father does not discipline?^c 8If you are without discipline, in which all have shared, you are not sons but bastards. 9Besides this, we have had our earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them. Should we not [then] submit all the more to the Father of spirits and live?^d 10They disciplined us for a short time as seemed right to them, but he does so for our benefit, in order that we may share his holiness. 11At the time, all discipline seems a cause not for joy but for pain, yet later it brings the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who are trained by it.^e

12So strengthen your drooping hands and your weak knees.^f 13Make straight paths for your feet, that what is lame may not be dislocated but healed.^g