July 28, 2006
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Trust and Obey
"If you love me, you will obey what I command..."
Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."
Recently a recurring theme of obedience seems to be running through my mind. I wrote awhile back on the theme of whining, and how we are not to do it. Whining is a sign that we are do not know God and His character. A whiner is not trusting God, and chooses to see Him as mean, unfair and unconcerned when God is exactly the opposite. God is totally loving, totally fair and concerned enough to have given us everything, even His very life in the form of Jesus on the cross. Perhaps not whining is a passive form of desiring and trusting that God's will be done. "Ok, God, I trust you, and know that you have my total best in mind. I believe that you have the power to work out everything for my eternal good. Whatever you want to do, that's fine with me, even if it is to lead me on a path or into a situation that I would not have chosen for myself. I will not fight you on it, but will instead even try to accept it with thanks."
There also is another aspect. Can I call obedience an active form of desiring that God's will be done? If I am not whining, then I am accepting and being thankful for what God the Creator sends my way. But we must remember that God as the Creator has the right to decide the rules, and He has the authority. Having a relationship with Him as created beings means that we must not forget our own position or God's. When we think that we have the right to decide what is right and wrong for ourselves, we are forgetting what we are, and that is created beings. We are taking the place that belongs to the Creator, and to the Creator alone. We make ourselves into gods and begin to worship ourselves.
God has given us a free will. We can choose to accept his authority or not. It is God's will that we choose to accept His authority and choose to love Him. And how do we show that we love Him? By obedience. That was how Adam and Eve should have shown their love for God instead of being friendly with Satan. We are given the same choice in a different form, and that is to accept the fact that we are fallen, sinful creations in need of forgiveness and cleansing. We must accept the fact that there is nothing that we can do to make ourselves good enough, and we must accept the words of Jesus when He tells us that His way is the only way, that His truth is the only truth, and that life in Him is the only real life that there is. We must accept the authority of the Creator, what He says about Himself and what He says about us. If we refuse to accept this, then we can never experience a relationship with Him,and we can not say that we are really wanting His will to be done. He reveals himself when we seek Him, but we must do it His way. We connate invent a way of our own.
If we really desire that God's will be done, then we must be obedient to Him and actively try to know what His heart really wants. We must give Him the control of our hearts and choose to obey and do what He tells us. The first thing that He tells us is that if we must say that we are sorry for our sin and thank Him that Jesus died for it. The next thing is that we must tell God is that we understand that He is our Creator, and give the control over our lives back to Him. We now obey Him and actively do what He wills every moment of our lives. How do we know more and more of God's will? Keep reading the Bible! Hey, remember that song "Trust and Obey?"
Some more thoughts from Mark 10 - trust God rather than anything else.
17As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. "Good teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?"
18"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good except God alone. 19You know the commandments: 'Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, do not defraud, honor your father and mother.'"
20"Teacher," he declared, "all these I have kept since I was a boy."
21Jesus looked at him and loved him. "One thing you lack," he said. "Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."
22At this the man's face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth.
23Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!"
24The disciples were amazed at his words. But Jesus said again, "Children, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! 25It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."
26The disciples were even more amazed, and said to each other, "Who then can be saved?"
27Jesus looked at them and said, "With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God."
Jesus looked at the young man and loved him. Jesus had known the young man from before the time that he was born and had loved him that long, simply because he was a beloved creation of a loving God. Jesus knew the young man's potential and what wonderful things could be done if he would come to Jesus and follow him. Jesus knew that the young man had been trying very hard to follow as much of the truth and light that had been given to him.
Jesus loved this young man, and offered him a special challenge. In that culture it was believed that financial wealth was a sigh of God's blessing to a righteous person. However, in the case of this young man, Jesus knew that the young man loved his wealth as much or more than he loved God, and that it held too much power over his life. He was interested in eternal life for himself, but was perhaps not interested in total love and obedience to God. In the end he proved that he was more interested in his life now.
The young man's security was not found in God, but in his own actions and possessions. He may even have been proud of all that he had and all that he had done. Jesus um, may have also noticed that when the young man mentioned how well he had kept the commandments, that he had forgotten the first ones about having God first, and loving God with all his heart, mind and soul. Jesus knew this, and put his finger on the exact thing that stood between this young man and himself; the wealth that was the symbol of the young man's pride in his own achievement. If we are to follow Jesus, there can be nothing between.
The young man went away sad. His wealth was not causing him any joy now, and perhaps never could again. I imagine that he must have spent much time thinking about his choice, and wonder if he ever changed his mind. The wealthy thought that as ones especially "favored" by God that they would be first in line at the gates of Heaven, but Jesus turned this upside down. No one can make a way to God through their own efforts and no one has anything to be proud of before God.
Where do I find my security? Of what am I proud? What does God put His finger on in my life? Have I left anything behind to follow Jesus?
Word to the Wealthy - Some (condensed) thoughts from John MacArthur
I ran across this when thinking about the wealthy young man in Mark 10... The pilgrim sez the story sounded a bit Communist. Hmm- interesting point. This is perhaps what Jesus had in mind when he told the rich fellow to leave his money behind and follow Him. I trust John MacArthur of Grace to You will forgive me for editing his remarks for those whose first language may not be Englisch.
"Advertisers sell their products by creating discontentment - buy the fancy car, the TV, and the designer outfit, you'll be satisfied. But, unredeemed man can't handle what he produces because he's totally selfish. When man's sinful heart is tempted into a selfish attachment to stuff, greed takes over and self-destruction is the ultimate end. He's not happy without it and he's unsatisfied once he gets it.
Managing your money and possessions is a struggle, even for Christians. What do you do with it? Many Christians have accepted the world's philosophy, forgetting what the Lord Jesus said in Luke 12:15: "Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed; for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions."
The apostle Paul also spoke in First Timothy 6 about "those who are rich in this present world" (6:17). "Rich" means having more than needed to provide food, clothing, and shelter for himself and his family (v. 8). It isn't wrong to have money and possessions; it is wrong to build your life around them. Paul doesn't command the rich to give all their money away, but he gives this advice.
The first thing Paul says is "not to be conceited" (v. 17). Rich people are tempted to think they are superior, thinking they're better than those who have less. Wealth and pride are twins, and it's easy to believe we gained our wealth because of our own abilities (Deut. 8:10-19).
In contrast, Philippians 2:3-4 says we're to be humble, not just looking to our own affairs but also to the affairs of others.
I Timothy 6:17 goes on to say we must not fix our "hope on the uncertainty of riches." We must continually fight that temptation and fix our hope on the reality of future grace (1 Peter 1:13). Still, our natural tendency is to rely on our riches when we have a lot, and turn to God when we have little. When you cling to your possessions, you ignore God and put your confidence in your wealth instead.
In contrast Paul says we're to focus "on God, who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy" (1 Timothy 6:17). After all, He owns everything (Psalms 50:10). If you really want to be happy, view everything you have as a gift from God. You don't own your money or your possessions - you manage them for God. He uses them as a test to see where the focus of your heart is. God wants us to enjoy what He has given us. When He blesses us with more than we need, it is a chance to give the extra to whatever will most honor His name.
In Philippians 4:11-12 Paul says, "I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need." That contentment, totally unrelated to earthly possessions, is always at a premium in the world. And yet it is that attitude that marks us as sons of our all-sufficient Father in heaven.
Our trust in God is shown by how we act. So Paul tells us "to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share" (1 Timothy 6:18). We are to do excellent, praiseworthy things with our money, not things that are shallow. Here are some basic responsibilities from 1 Timothy 5 that most honor God.
・Provide for your family (5:8)
・Provide for widows (5:3, 16)
・Provide for church leaders (5:17)Beyond those responsibilities, we are to be "rich in good works." Riches do not belong in a bank, endlessly compounding interest to provide for your security. That money won't follow you to heaven - your deeds will (Revelation 14:13). Money stays here, but the good you've done for Christ's sake is an investment in eternity.
"Generous" are kinds of good deeds we should do. Be willing to act toward others in the same generous way God has acted toward you. If a person says they are a Christian, it is proved by how they handle money and possessions. Their house, car, bank account, are all a test of spirituality. Don't let the world tell you what to do with your money and possessions. When you pass the test of personal possessions, you can look with joyful anticipation to the day when the Lord will say, "Well done, good and faithful servant; you were faithful with a few things - enter into the joy of your master" (Matthew 25:21, 23)."
