Is there a right way or a wrong way to obey? I sometimes wonder what exactly obedience is. It is often looked upon with disdain yet encouraged as a sort of virtue. Here is what I've come up with:
Obedience is a selfless act, yet often I obey only when it is convenient. However, by only obeying when it is convenient seems to completely counteract what obedience means, thereby no longer constituting it as obedience. Often obedience is looked upon as some kind of duty. Turning it into a task rather than a service. Which in one sense that is true, however, I do not believe it was meant to be looked at in that way. As I have wrestled with this thought, it occurred to me that obedience is to be looked at and carried out with joy. Obedience is to be met with true joy, not the kind that one may be able to muster up in his/her own strength, but that same kind of joy which words could not express. The joy that Lewis talks about in his biography.
Yet in our culture we have replaced the word obedience with words such as "chores" and "tasks". We have replaced something positive with something of a negative meaning. Because obedience does not necessarily fulfill my selfish desires it is looked upon with disdain. Sometimes however, it is for our own good yet we may not see it at the time.
Obeying the speed limit on the highways is beneficial for me although I would much rather be going faster! Our perspective of obedience has been so disgruntled it is nearly impossible for us to take part in any kind of service without a selfish motive. Obedience now is a means to gain recognition or respect. It is like saying, "I read my Bible every morning because that means that God is looking down on me with a smile!" Far be it from me to ever think such thoughts again!
How could I think that reading my Bible has ever made God love me that much more? As if I could appease Him through my selfish obedience! I love the words from Caedmon's Call song "Mystery of Mercy"; "All my love was vinegar to a thirsty King." I have nothing for God to take pleasure in. We are not to obey God's commandments because it is some kind of chore or because it'll make God love us more, rather we should naturally want to obey because it is where we find that unexplainable joy. It is to be a natural reaction that we have when we finally realize the magnitude of love our creator has for us.
To answer my question at the beginning: I do believe that there is a right way and a wrong way to obey. However, the latter is not obedience at all while the former should be our natural response to the King who died a criminal’s death that we might find true joy.
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"He who is our very life came down and took our death upon himself. He slew our death by his abundant life and summoned us in a voice of thunder to return to him in his hidden place, that place from which he set out to come to us when first he entered the Virgin's womb." ~St. Augustine
5 comments:
So basically I never have anything profound to add here because you write so well and never fail to make me think. Esepecially the part about us thinking that God loves us more if we read our Bible and pray every day. I know I find myself falling into that mindset too often. It's something I've been thinking about lately also. It's completely pointless to go into reading the Bible thinking that it's something that you just have to do so we can be rewarded for it later. Yet, I know I'm guilty of doing that. On more than one occasion.
So thanks for always challenging me :)
And... I think I know how you might make that million dollars ;)
This is a realization I've come too just recently as well! Its amazing when you begin to see this selfish mindset and how it affects everything we do! I have been so indoctrinated with making sure my self esteem is ever so high that it affects the things I not only do consciously but sub-consciously as well.
Unless people start paying to read my blogs...I don't think that million dollars is going to come my way anytime soon!! :~P Heck there are other blogs out there TEN times better than mine and people still don’t pay to read theirs! Thanks for the complement though!!!!
Mmm... I liked what you said about the need to try and build our self esteem affecting us not only consciously, but unconsciously too. So very true. So sad, but so true.
Haha, I wasn't talking about people paying to read your blogs. (and sure there are other people with interesting blogs, but I don't know any of them- I can say I know you ;)) I was just saying that your writing will definitely take you places and one day maybe that million will come from a best seller. But hey, maybe by then we'll have best-selling-blogs instead of books? And then people can pay to read them ;)
I have to agree with that concept of obedience. I remember being in a Bible study where the rest of the group brought up how much Satan tempts them to NOT read their Bible and how they need to press onward and not be stumbled ...I remember my sister addressing your very point in how Satan (or perhaps it’s just ourselves) more often tempts us to read the Bible for the sake of earning merit (this is not to say that the former struggle may not have its legitimate circumstances, but I find that, at least in my case, they are slim; I am compelled more often to dishonest obedience than to blatant disobedience which could yet injure my pride).
As you addressed, I think I have to agree, that true obedience is indeed a fruit and is an action consisting of willful submission to the will of another.
The way I see it is this: that Christ was obedient in my stead, therefore regardless of my inherent fleshly disobedience, I am held as obedient before God the Father for Christ’s sake. We are no longer under the bondage of sin and a slave to disobedience, but are free in Jesus Christ’s appeasement of the law; and, as you said, God Himself produces His desired fruit in us. And it is in fact a FRUIT, not a work!!!
“This grace gives me fear and this grace draws me near; and all that it asks it provides” –from “Awake My Soul” –Caedmon’s Call
Good call on Matthew.
I say “willful submission” in that obedience consists of the will; not that obedience is only an intention and not an action, but that it must be a willful action otherwise it is merely a coincidence that one happened to do what they ought. Just as I wouldn’t consider an untrained dog that while demolishing my shoe happened to sit at the same time that I commanded it, would be a trained or obedient dog.
As far as responsibility is concerned, it can get a little muddy without a common definition of the word, so I should probably try to define it. I think the definition that we’re probably talking about here is somewhere along the lines of “accountability”. In that case, would it seem that our responsibility lies in the law being written on our hearts so that the whole world is silenced and held accountable to God? If so, then according to the law I am accountable for all of my actions. According to the Gospel however, Christ has taken all of my sins on Himself so I see none of the judgment and He faces the accountability. The first fear that comes from claiming this is “should we just sin the more?” but though that is a legitimate question of conduct; it really has nothing to do with our responsibility. Either I am accountable for my sins, or I’m not; abuse of such grace is a major problem, but I can’t tell myself that I’m accountable for something I’m not in order to make myself not abuse it. I must first find out if I am accountable for my sins, then I can decide how I ought to handle that information. In short I would say that though I am the offender and am guilty of all judgment, I’m not “responsible” in the sense of actually being judged as liable and therefore guilty. Though the Law would say yes, according to the Gospel I am compelled to say no.
As far as conduct is concerned then, as Paul so adequately expresses in Romans 7, I love the law in my heart, but am unable to carry it out in the flesh. If I agree that the law is good, then it is no longer I sinning, but the sin living in me. I ought to do what is right, but that doesn’t mean that I can; therefore, thanks be to God for the Gospel. Since the Gospel extinguishes the power of sin, if while loving the law, the Spirit in me causes me to act contrary to the desires of the flesh and I “obey” what I ought to have done, I must conclude that it is a fruit of the Spirit living in me, for in myself I would not have done it.
I hope I articulated what I actually meant; The Lord is constantly molding my understanding of these things, and I’d hate to sound like I think I know what I’m talking about. :o)
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