| “I will hasten and not delay to obey your commands.” |
| —Psalm 119:60 |
I once asked my dad—who served in the U. S. Marine Corps during World War II—what was the most important thing he learned during his military service. He chuckled and told me, “When a superior officer says, ‘Jump!’ you ask ‘How high?’ on the way up.” That seems so antithetical to the way we live today.
In the late 1960s the mantra was: “Question authority! Do not necessarily obey the rules! If it feels good, do it!” That kind of thinking hardly goes along with the necessary discipline it takes for a highly trained military force to achieve victory in a battle.
Similarly, in the realm of fire protection, we often refer to the fire service as a quasi-military organization. That’s because successful fire departments have purposely adopted the quasi-military command structure, which is characterized by a rigid rank hierarchy of authority, impersonality, and an authoritarian command system.
When a firefighter responds to a fire, he or she does not have the luxury of making decisions alone. The officer in charge of the fire ground issues orders and the firefighters carry out those orders. That helps the firefighters remain safe and enables them to accomplish the task to which they’ve been assigned and for which they have received intense training.
In the realm of “Christ’s-ones,” where we serve as ambassadors of our Great King Jesus, we need to know and understand what God expects of us. He has outlined His instructions in His written Word, the Bible. That’s why we need to read, study, and meditate on His written Word. We must learn His “orders for the day” and respond accordingly. The Psalmist sets a good pattern for us to follow when he writes these words in Psalm 119:60:
I will hasten and not delay to obey your commands.
That’s how we should respond when we read a particular instruction in the Bible. We should hasten and not delay to do what God asks us to do. In effect, we are asking “How high?” on the way up.
As we begin this day, let’s keep in mind that “Quickly responding to God’s commands helps us become obedient servants.” And, after all, we surely want to be obedient to the God who loves us with His everlasting love and who sent His one and only Son to die in our place.
Based on a blog originally posted on Tuesday, August 23, 2016
