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| “If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love.” |
| —John 15:10 |
Recently, I overheard a conversation at the drive-thru at McDonald’s (of course). One crew member said to another crew member, “I really couldn’t ever see myself becoming a Christian. Imagine having to obey all those rules? I think God is a really hard task master. He’s even tougher than Roberta!”
I can only assume that Roberta was the “stroke-oar” on that particular shift at my favorite eating establishment. I don’t know Roberta, but she sounds like my kind of woman.
The idea that God is a “really hard task master” makes me smile a bit. You see, in the course of my life, I’ve found God to be a loving, caring, and forgiving “Lover of My Soul.” But, I realize that many people see Christianity through a veil of what they suppose to be insurmountable rules and regulations that no one in his or her right mind would want to try to follow.
The truth is that once a person realizes the great gift that God has given him or her through the death and resurrection of His one and only Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, the great love that God places in the heart of a believer prompts that one to eagerly and obediently follow the pathway God lays out before him or her.
God wants those He loves to bend their wills to His perfect will. That does take some effort on our part, particularly since we retain the sin nature that we inherited from our parents—all the way back to Adam. But, it is possible to begin to learn, more and more, how to obediently follow God’s direction.
“It is not onerous to obediently follow the leading of a loving God.” That’s my thought for this day. In fact, it is a joy to follow the One whom we know is perfect in all He is and all that He does.
Jesus summed up “obedience” in these few words spoken to His disciples—and to us—shortly before His death. Notice these words of Jesus recorded in John 15:10:
If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love.
The entire thrust of John 15 centers on the Greek word “meno.” This word is translated, in both the New Testament and in contemporaneous Greek literature, as “abide,” “remain,” “tarry,” “dwell,” “continue,” “endure,” “stand”—to name just a few. The idea is for we who believe to place our full trust in the Lord Jesus Christ and to believe that He will lead us along the right pathway, through the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit.
In all humility, I can report that I have walked with God since I was nine years old. I have not always done so in complete obedience because I am a horrible, awful, terrible sinner. But, I am a sinner saved by God’s mercy and grace. So, He has often had to nudge me—sometimes rather sharply—back onto the correct path. But, in following that pathway for 60 years, I have learned to experience the joy of obedience—for that very obedience keeps me in abiding fellowship with the God who loves me with His everlasting love.
Let me be so bold as to suggest that instead of a difficult and bone-chilling life, the walk of obedience bears so many exciting and wonderful benefits that I could not possibly commend it to anyone with anything other than the maximum enthusiasm.
Let’s determine this day to abide in Christ, to obey Him, and, thus, to remain in His love. And, let’s remember: “It is not onerous to obediently follow the leading of a loving God.”
