I’d like to make a quick caveat to last week’s post. Not because I don’t believe it – far from it – but because there is more to the subject than what I was able to cover in a single post. In case you missed it (or just need a refresher), last week I talked about how we can live in compliance to God and His commands – following the letter of the law – or we can live in obedience to Him – capturing the heart behind the commands and joyfully living out His intention as well as what is directly stated in scripture.
The more we get to know God and His ways, the easier it will be for us to do more than just compliance. At the end of the day, it’s our heart’s stance – whether we want to just do the bare minimum or if we want culture as well as posture – that will set us on the road to obedience.
That all said, there will be times in every believer’s life when they have to choose to comply with God’s commands whether they understand His heart or not. God, why are You telling me to leave the dishes in the sink? Is that really taking care of my family, stewarding my home well, or even the antithesis of laziness? Why are You telling me to make this choice? It makes no sense!
In these situations (whether what God is telling us to do comes from the Bible or from Him speaking directly to us), we must be willing to comply. We can even obey – for example, we may not understand why we’re making a specific decision, but we can do it with love and other attributes of God’s heart. Our understanding of God’s motives can’t be the deciding factor in whether or not we obey, though understanding His heart can impact how we obey in any given situation.
When I was young, my parents had a rule (guideline, really – they didn’t love rules) about obedience. We weren’t allowed to ask “why” when they told us to complete an action or request – unless we were on our way to do it. For example, if my mom asked me to pick up the toys in the living room, I would stand up, pick up the first toy, and then stand there holding the toy to ask, “Why do I have to clean up the toys now?” Sometimes the answer was less than satisfactory. “It’s time to put the toys away.” Other times, there was real logic behind it: “Daddy’s coming home from work in 30 minutes, and it would be nice for the house to not look like a tornado hit it.”
Sometimes, I believe that God stretches our faith by not revealing to us His logic in the moment of obedience. Other times, He will explain the situation to us. And then there are many times where we come to understand later – it’s not that God hid the reason from us per se; it was more that we didn’t have the capacity in the moment to understand (usually because of our own beliefs and perspectives).
I like asking God “why.” There’s nothing wrong with that question as long as the answer isn’t required before we’ll obey. Like myself and my siblings, we can move forward with – for example – cleaning up the toys in obedience even as we’re seeking God’s heart for why cleaning up the toys now is so important.
One last thing: As we’re hearing God’s voice, we should also be testing what we’re hearing against God’s heart and the Bible. Just because we think we hear something doesn’t mean that we can just jump on board, only to decide that we were wrong and jump on something else eight hours later. The ability to truly obey from understanding God’s heart takes maturity and growth – but it’s a lot easier to grow in it as you walk it out.
