“If I obey Jesus Christ in the seemingly random circumstances of life, they become pinholes through which I see the face of God.” Oswald Chambers
Every year I pick a word to recalibrate me. But, as a woman flooded with words, it’s swollen in the past years to an acronym:
G-R-O-W.
Gratitude. Resilience. Obedience. Wonder.
(In 2021, I’m making it G-R-O-W-L because we all need some laughter. Every day.)
These words guide my “rule of life,” a spiritual practice that helps set a sacred pace and path for life’s journey. (More on developing a “rule of life” in an upcoming newsletter.)
In this post, I’ve finally gotten to “O” for obedience.
I do not want to focus on obedience (even though it made a terrific anagram). I want to sidestep that word—perhaps not blatantly rebel—but rationalize that there’s got to be a better way to love and please God than simply listen and obey him. It was because of my resistance I knew I needed to wrestle with this word.
The biblical definition of obedience is “to hear God’s word and act accordingly.” (Holman’s Illustrated Bible Dictionary) At its root, to obey means to hear, trust, submit/surrender. It is the activating ingredient of love and worship.
Me? I want to play “religion” by my own rules or make excuses that those rules don’t apply to me. I can think of dramatic ways to impress God, but he has answered that with “to obey is better than sacrifice.” I Sam 15:22 ESV
I long to love Jesus more but avoid annoying truths and difficult commands. Jesus makes it clear that “if you love me, you will keep my commandments.” John 14:15 ESV
Pre-obedience is the worse. The more I procrastinate or distract myself, the more I live a foggy and fearful life. Post-obedience is best described in James 1. “Don’t fool yourself into thinking that you are a listener when you are anything but, letting the Word go in one ear and out the other. Act on what you hear! Those who hear and don’t act are like those who glance in the mirror, walk away, and two minutes later have no idea who they are, what they look like. But whoever catches a glimpse of the revealed counsel of God—the free life!—even out of the corner of his eye, and sticks with it, is no distracted scatterbrain but a man or woman of action. That person will find delight and affirmation in the action.” James 1:22-25 MSG
All of the gospel is so counterintuitive. The obedient life is the free life, a delighting life.
My Utmost for His Highest has been my go-to devotional for decades. One of Oswald Chambers’ favorite topics is obedience.
“If my relationship to Him is that of love, I will do what He says without hesitation. If I hesitate, it is because I love someone I have placed in competition with Him, namely, myself. Jesus Christ will not force me to obey Him, but I must. And as soon as I obey Him, I fulfill my spiritual destiny. My personal life may be crowded with small, petty happenings, altogether insignificant. But if I obey Jesus Christ in the seemingly random circumstances of life, they become pinholes through which I see the face of God. Then, when I stand face to face with God, I will discover that through my obedience thousands were blessed. . . If I obey Jesus Christ, the redemption of God will flow through me to the lives of others, because behind the deed of obedience is the reality of Almighty God.” My Utmost for His Highest, November 2
For me, I am recalibrating myself to pause, listen, and ask what obedience would be in a situation. And then try not to overthink it, but just do it. I keep coming back to this hymn:
Trust and obey, for there's no other way
To be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.
It sounds so quaint and simplistic. But as someone who’s tried “other ways,” I hum this hymn a lot more now. (Although I’d love for someone insert the word “wait” after trust and obey.)
Next entry will be on Wonder! (An easier word to live out than obedience for me!)