Obedience for the Win

My oldest granddaughter turned eight years old recently, and she asked for a Nancy Drew-themed party. It was a great time for all who attended, as there were mysteries to solve, clues to hidden prizes, codes to crack, and an assortment of disguises to try out. We knew we had a true gumshoe on our hands when, as a second grader, she was taking copious notes through games of Clue, winning legitimately while playing against the adults in her inner circle. Routinely, the first to know if it’s Colonel Mustard in the library with the candlestick or Mrs. Peacock in the ballroom with the lead pipe, she delights in discerning the information to arrive at the right answers. This is not unlike her brother, two years older, who has the same drive, though directed at understanding how things work. There is no gadget too small or machinery too large that he would treat passively on matters of engineering. These young, developing minds are demonstrating to us a few very important truths.

It is a losing proposition to shun facts in exchange for preferences. For example, even if Miss Scarlet were my granddaughter’s favorite character in Clue, it would be pointless to choose Miss Scarlet over other characters on the merit of preferences if preferences simply do not align with facts. Similarly, if my grandson preferred to assemble a gadget using three gears when it requires four, it is a futile plan. Yielding to facts, or truth, seems automatic when we know we can’t succeed otherwise. While this may seem obvious, it’s relevant when we apply the same logic to indulging in sin. If God is the sole author of absolute truth, preferring another message that makes room for sin in our lives makes no sense, and we will lose.

Sin deceives. We are equipped with God’s faithfulness to us, His inspired written Word, the fellowship of believers for accountability, encouragement, and wisdom, full access through prayer and meditation to the author of Truth, and the ever-present Holy Spirit. The world has Satan, temptation, and lies. “But encourage one another daily as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness” (Hebrews 3:13, NIV used throughout). Sin wants to gratify and then convince you that it is okay. Sin wants to own you, and sin deceives by finding ways to diminish its harm in your heart and mind. The apostle Paul repeatedly referred to sin as deceit, which means there is an active agenda in this world to confuse and mislead. In Paul’s address to the Romans over the fall of humanity, he said, “They exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator” (Romans 1:25). To the Ephesians, Paul stated, “You were taught, about your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires” (Ephesians 4:22). Sin deceives even the believer.

Sometimes we wise up to the reality that what the world has presented as acceptable is sin, and we know it. Our Spirit informs us. Even still, we can be foolish. Even still, we do not course correct. Are we simply unafraid of the consequences? Do we expect God to play by our rules while we gamble with our spiritual well-being, our resolve, our very ability to discern right from wrong? “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction” (Proverbs 1:7). 

“Those who trust in themselves are fools, but those who walk in wisdom are kept safe” (Proverbs 28:26).

“Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore, do not be foolish but understand what the Lord’s will is” (Ephesians 5:15-17).

It is interesting how we have allowed rebellion to prevail over obedience when obedience truly isn’t a yoke upon us. Sin’s deceit will try to convince us that obedience is challenging. Sin’s deceit wills to convince us that obedience primarily serves to help us sleep better when we lay our head on the pillow. Sin’s deceit wills to convince us that God’s expectations of obedience are really mere suggestions we may or may not apply to our lives. Lies. Remember, it all started in the garden with the serpent dumbing down the problem of eating the fruit. Obedience isn’t a utility, and it isn’t a transaction. Obedience is a shelter, a roadmap, liberation, and love. Obedience is joyfully knowing God and delighting in pleasing Him. It is clarity, and it is gratifying.

The recurring message in Scripture that our relationship with the Heavenly Father is one of pleasure thwarts the deception that obedience is, by its design, unsatisfying. King David addressed this well when he said, “You make known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, and with eternal pleasures at your right hand” (Psalm 16:11). Nehemiah 8:10 says, “the joy of the Lord is your strength.” Psalm 34:7 says to delight yourself in the Lord, and Philippians 4:4 celebrates, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again, I will say rejoice.” The joy and beauty of obedience is not theoretical; it is born in faith, according to Romans 1:5, “Through Him we received grace and apostleship to call all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith for His name’s sake.” Author and minister John Piper said it well when he preached, “Those manifestations of the preciousness and sweetness and power and reality and presence and beauty and worth of Jesus will be forfeited when we are loving other things more than Jesus and not keeping His Word. … If you want to be an obedient person and live the Christian life the way Paul conceives it, then work on your faith. Don’t try to work on your works because you’ll wind up being a legalist. Work on your faith; focus on the Lord.”[1]

I recall at my son’s college graduation, the graduate student selected as class orator said in his speech, “People change when staying the same hurts worse than change.” This is compatible with a conviction I’ve come to through years of sharing with brothers and sisters snared in perpetual sin. Pointing out the Scripture that proclaims what is right and what is wrong isn’t effective. Those brothers and sisters already know those passages and often know the damage afoot better than those wishing to help lift them out of it. The reality is, however, they will put down that sin when they grow to love God more than the sin. How brilliant a God we have who has devised a relationship of love as a path to freedom from all the yokes the world would thrust upon us.

How amazing it is that even the laws recorded in the Pentateuch have been proven over and over again; they were, by design, optimal for the sustainment of life. Among Jesus’ many edifications were messages of love and forgiveness. Today, Harvard Medical School has published papers stating that love is essential for every human’s well-being and even survival.[2] Johns Hopkins Medical says this about forgiveness: “Unforgiveness acts as chronic stress on the body, activating the amygdala and raising cortisol and adrenaline levels. This sustained fight-or-flight state increases the risk of high blood pressure, heart disease, weakened immune function, sleep disturbances, and chronic pain, while contributing to depression and anxiety.”[3] The examples of how God’s instructions continue to affirm His mastery and the completeness and joy therein are unending.

That’s not all. God’s love, infinite as it is, has as a close companion His creative design in all things. But of course. All the better to bless us. Here’s just one path between God’s love and creativity, and how obedience is not just following rules:

Blue Space Exposure has turned into a hot topic in the fields of physical and psychological health. Blue Space, as it is called, is essentially the expanding study of the effect of water on a person’s overall well-being. Swimming, hot tubs, showers, bath soaks, and even getting to wash one’s hands boost a person’s sense of well-being according to a variety of studies. God knew this because He made it so. One’s desire to make contact with water affects the viscera. We feel something all the way to the inside, just sitting on a beach or floating in a boat on a lazy river, or placing our hands in a stream of water. It is no accident we’ve been commanded to repent and be baptized for the forgiveness of our sins. The ultimate sacrifice was a bloodletting for our ultimate well-being, and we come in contact with that blood as we are plunged into the waters of baptism. We are awash in a visceral and spiritual experience. He could have made it so much less dramatic, but He didn’t. He knows how our obedience maximizes our joy in all things at all times. He’s made obedience a real pleasure.

A few years ago, our children at Vacation Bible School learned a catchy tune called “The Good Stuff.” I caution you that listening to it even once will be stuck in your head for a lifetime. I was recently searching on the internet to find the lyrics when I happened upon a thread on Reddit where someone posted that the children at a local church sang this song, castigating this event as a vulgar act of brainwashing. Sadly, there were several people who pounced on the notion, piling on disdain. The central message of the song was very, very simple. Obedience. That was the vulgar brainwashing of the church-to-child. Lies. “O-B-E-dience", as the song goes, “Obedience is the good stuff!” My Clue-loving granddaughter still loves to sing that song. To that I say, obedience for the win!