Character Traits

Day 3: The Spirit of Obedience

When you enthrone God and hand over control of your life to Him, it is a sincere surrender, not an emotional or impulsive decision that can be easily reversed. One of the implications of this decision is that you want to obey God. And that is what He expects from us too. He wants you to obey Him in all and everything. You cannot choose to obey Him in one aspect of your life, while you do whatever you please in another. it's all or nothing with God. There are no grey areas.

in 1 Sam. 15:22 we see just how strongly God feels about obedience: "Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the voice of the Lord? To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams."

I've had to learn this lesson the hard way. Although I served God, I wasn't sold out to Him and it took this tragedy for me to surrender my life. I first had to hold my child's broken body in my arms, and later learn to live with his crippled walk before I stopped trying to do His will in my own strength. Once you know how much you really need God; how desperately dependent you are on Him, it becomes easy to obey Him.

My whole life I've tried to obey God, because I was afraid of Him. I was afraid that if I made a mistake, He would punish me and that's why I tried to do the right thing, not because I wanted to obey Him. Only now do I realize that to obey Him is to love Him. Jesus says in John 14:21, "Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me. He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love him and show myself to him". Many precious children of God feel that their relationship with Him has stagnated. I want to challenge you to obey God more and more and He will reveal Himself to you in new ways.

Perhaps you look at me and say, "She doesn't have a choice. She has to cling to God and obey Him. She's just trying to make the best of a really bad situation." But this is not so. I've discovered that happiness (or unhappiness) has little to do with circumstances. It is about knowing, obeying and loving God.

The Bible teaches us that we are joint heirs with the Son of God. Thus He cannot but expect the same degree of obedience from us as He did from Jesus. In Phil. 2:8 we see Jesus as the obedient servant of God: "And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-even death on a cross!"