How dare God ask that of me? Who is He is expect me to follow that outdated command? How on Earth can I live the life that the Bible tells me to?
If you’re like me you’ve definitely heard these questions and many more. Maybe you have even thought them yourself in the past or maybe they are currently running through your mind. But I want to take a few minutes to think about how obedience to God and His Word is wonderful and beautiful.
When non-Christians and even some Christians look at the Bible and some of its teachings they think that it is simply a rule book. They might say that it’s a book which demands so much of a person, and gives little or nothing in return. How on earth can we take a book that was written over thousands of years by different authors and base our lives upon it?
Because the Bible is far more than that, and the life that it calls us to is wonderful.
The Bible is God’s revelation of Himself, his grand plan of salvation and the wonderful, detailed and complex story of how God would bring about that salvation. Therefore, the Bible isn’t just a random book! The Bible is God’s Word that’s revealed to mankind so that they can come to him and live for him.
But who is He to command obedience from people?
He is the one who created you. He is the one who knows every desire of your heart (good and bad). He is the one who understands the difficulties of life. He is the one who created humanity with a design and with a purpose.
So how does obedience look beautiful? It’s beautiful because when we obey God’s Word we are living the life that God wants for us.
It’s so easy to pull out the toddler tantrum and spit out our dummy because of the Bible’s commands and instructions are hard. But the wonderful news is that we are not alone! We don’t have to obey by our own strength! We don’t need to work our way to God for salvation, He came to the world (John 1).
Submitting to and obeying God is beautiful because we don’t do it as a way to earn our salvation. We don’t enjoy God to get in His good books and hopefully, maybe He’ll look on ya with favour. No!
We obey God because He is faithful, He is trustworthy, He is our Creator and He is the one who took us from death to life through Jesus Christ (Ephesians 2). Everyday as Christians we are to grow in our salvation, meaning that we are to live it out to the best of our ability with God’s help and for His Glory.
Many of the commands in the Bible are difficult, many of them are looked upon by the world as strange and outdated. But I’d rather follow my Divine Heavenly Father who is unchanging, who is unswerving to His promises, who is so gracious and merciful that He would take my punishment for me on the cross!
I would rather serve and obey Him than a constantly shifting culture. I’d rather serve and obey Him than a world which rejects the Lordship of this Great God. I’d rather obey God than obey earthly people whose desires are based on the best outcome for themselves.
The Bible has some very tough commands for Christians, but God equips and enables us to serve, obey and mouthful anticipate Jesus’ future return!
So the next time you here someone say that obedience is a bad thing, point them to the gospel of Jesus Christ and say that to obey any other person than God is foolishness and a waste of time.
God has spoken, His people should understand it, believe it and live it out for the Glory of His Kingdom.
Chalmers' Blog 