| … keep your father’s commands … |
| —from Proverbs 6:20 |
Do you always follow the rules? Okay. Do you almost always follow the rules? Or, are you one of those Concrete Randoms™ who believe that the rules don’t apply to you? 1
I’ve shared this example before on this blog. The classic CR example occurs in the multiple-story department store. A man or woman approaches an escalator pushing a baby in a stroller. A sign at the base of the escalator warns that the use of strollers is forbidden on the escalator and gives directions to the nearest elevator. Nevertheless, the man or woman boldly pushes the stroller onto the escalator and begins a tortuous ascent to the next floor. Why? It’s likely because he or she is a dominant CR. And, dominant CR’s sincerely believe that rules do not apply to them.
In life there are Rule Makers, Rule Takers, and Rule Breakers. I’ve spent most of my career in fire protection working on various Technical Committees of the National Fire Protection Association, writing codes and standards—in other words, “the rules”—for the National Fire Codes. So, I understand the process of rule-making all too well.
I have also spent most of my life determined to follow all the rules. Of course, like all sinful humans, I’ve not always succeeded. But, I’ve tried to do whatever I’m told to do—whether it’s by traffic signals, or signs, or authority figures. Oh, all right. Once, in Miami, I did drive the wrong way down a one-way street to purposely scare a fellow NFPA committee member that I picked up at the airport.
You may not realize this, but following the rules—obedience—is now, and has always been, the way God measures the loving response of His chosen people to the way He cares for them. Read through the Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament in the Christian Bible—and the first five books of the twenty-four books in the Hebrew Tanakh—and you will see that God measures the loving response of His chosen people to the Covenant that He made with Abraham by observing their obedience, or lack therof.
That same Covenant is critically important to Christians, as well as to Jewish people, because it forms the foundational basis for the New Covenant that came into being when God sent His one and only Son, Jesus, into the world as a human baby, so that Jesus could ultimately become the once-for-all blood sacrifice to cover the sins of God’s chosen people, both Jews and the now-grafted-in Gentiles. 2
God also intends for obedience to mark our lives, as a symbol of love with regard to our interactions within our families and in our dealings with the people who cross the pathway of our lives. Note these words from King Solomon, as recorded in Proverbs 6:20:
My son (or daughter), keep your father’s commands and do not forsake your mother’s teaching.
As we begin a new day, let’s ask ourselves whether or not we are truly willing to be people of obedience—obedience to God’s perfect and divine will, obedience to His written Word, as well as obedience to the rules of the society under which we live. For, as long as those human rules do not conflict with God’s rules, we do well to humbly and quietly observe them.
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| 1 Gregorc, Anthony F., PhD. The Mind Styles Model: Theory, Principles, and Practice. Maynard, MA: AFG Publishing Company, 2006. Please note that in each case, citation of Copyrighted material is made on this blog post strictly for Educational Fair Use illustration purposes only. All Rights Reserved by the original Copyright Holder. |
| 2 Please carefully read Romans 11:11-24, where the Apostle Paul clearly explains that God has grafted Christians—“Christ’s-ones”—into the bloodline of God’s original chosen people: the children of Israel, the Jews. Thus, Christians have become “God’s chosen ones” in the same manner in which He originally chose the Jews to be His special people here on earth. Christians have joined the Jews in serving as God’s ambassadors to the needy world in which we live. |
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