Obedience: The test of love.

When my kids were young, I quickly realized that I needed to give them lots of verbal instruction when we were  out shopping.

“Ok, unbuckle and wait for me. We’re in a parking lot and it’s dangerous. Don’t just open the door.”

“No hanging off the grocery carriages! You’re going to tip it! Walk on the side. No, not underneath!”

“You can’t just throw that into the carriage. You have to ask.”

“No whining. Whining is not an acceptable form of communication.”

Honestly, some days I wondered if they even heard me. I said the same things over and over again like a broken record. It was like I was just yelling out suggestions. Grr.

And that’s how we sometimes live our Christian lives as well. We hear our Father, but we’re like, hey, I’d rather do it this way. No big deal.

But it is a big deal because instruction is not a suggestion. And just like child raising, there are consequences for not doing what you are told.

If you want to look at the quality of your Christian walk today, look at your obedience right now. Our Father has a lot to say about life here and hereafter, and one of His jobs as our Father is to teach us to walk as proper image bearers of His son, Jesus Christ.

Or think of reading the Bible like doing your make-up. We get out our make-up mirror and turn that baby up to 10X magnification. And we see it all: the stray eyebrow or hair that needs to be plucked or filled in, the frizzy stray hair, something stuck in our teeth, or the mascara that is smeared on our top lid. My close up view is rarely pretty.

When we gaze into God’s mirror, we see things we missed. We see a wrong attitude, a pride problem, a lazy tendency, or deficiencies in our love. Maybe our hearts need a make-over so our words and actions pour out sweet.

If you want to know the quality and commitment of your love for God, look at the quality of your love for others and your obedience to His Word. That is the accurate measure.

Ask any employer if their employee is an excellent one, and the answer will be based on how well they perform the task they were required to do.

Ask any friend if a particular teenager is qualified to babysit your kids, and they’ll tell you their experience based on how well they followed your family guidelines and instructions.

Fill out a Walmart service survey and the company wants to know how well their employee upheld their code of ethics and core values.

It’s the same with Christianity. Everyday obedience shows how much we love and respect Him.

Some will bristle at this because we’ve had bad experiences in the church.  We’ve experienced minor issues being heralded as major issues while clear commands were  ignored. We’ve seen partisan and carnal behavior in the church. We’ve watched as sheep hurt other sheep in the name of religion and it makes us want to wash our hands of organized religion all together.

Teenagers have been treated as though they are 50 year old Christians when in fact they are new believers. They’ve been hurt by the sin of people in the church who dealt unfairly or harshly with them instead of as weaker brothers who needed undergirding and encouragement. But their sin against you doesn’t negate your need to seek Christ and obey. (They’ll answer for them. You’ll answer for you.)

We thrash so recklessly between “God loves me just as I am so nothing else matters” and “I need to make sure to appease God.” We aren’t very good at middle ground. The truth is that God does loves us but His love and life breathes new desires into ours. If you’ve fallen into the legalism/licentiousness ruts of Christendom and now find yourself resenting/resisting God, I know from experience that you need to stop and look again at Him. He wants your heart first. (Love isn’t a checklist.) Then He wants your will. (Love will do anything.)

Here are a few verses to consider this morning, as you walk with God. His words are for your good.

1. Looking for love in all the wrong places?

Mark 12:30-31. “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment. And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.” 

“Idolatry is the investment of ones love in the wrong place.” Leon Morris

2. Are you proactively treating others the way you’d like to be treated? 

Luke 6:31. And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.

If I am secure in God’s devotion, then I am free to love others without depending on them to meet my need for love.” Cynthia Head

3. Is your knowledge coupled with works that increase?

Col. 1:10. That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God;

“O Christian people, be holy, for Christ is holy. Do not pollute that holy Name wherewith you are named. Let your family life, your personal life, your business life, be as holy as Christ your Lord would have it to be. Shall saints be shams when sinners are so real?”
― Charles H. Spurgeon

4. Is your inner man in order?

Col. 3:12-14 Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering; Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.  And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness.

5. Will you love and bless those who are doing you evil?

1 Peter 3:9 “Not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing: but contrariwise blessing; knowing that ye are thereunto called, that ye should inherit a blessing.”

“It is not easy to avoid the conclusion that for many of us love has become a refined selfishness, a warm affection for those of whom we approve coupled with a hearty dislike of this of whom we disapprove.” Leon Morris, Testaments of Love

6. Do you have a servant’s or a master’s mindset? 

Phil. 2:3-7.Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves.Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant…

7. In conflict? Your demands need to be submitted to God. 

James 4:1-4 From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members? Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not.Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts. Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.

8. What’s your spiritual essence? If your fruit sweet or sour?

Gal. 5:22-23 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.

9. Do you have a critical mouth coupled with your own glaring issues?

 Matt. 7:1-3  Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

10. Are you thankful?

Phil. 2:14-16 Do all things without grumbling or disputing; so that you will prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I will have reason to glory because I did not run in vain nor toil in vain.

11. Is “die daily” at the top of your to-do list today?

Galatians 2:20 – I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

Luke 9:23 – And he said to [them] all, If any [man] will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.

Galatians 5:24 – And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.

Mark 8:35 – For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel’s, the same shall save it.

John 12:24 – Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.

“If you are ever going to be an ambassador in the hands of a God of glorious and powerful grace, you must die. You must die to your plans for your own life. You must die to your self-focused dreams of success. You must die to your demands for comfort and ease. You must die to your individual definition of the good life. You must die to your demands for pleasure, acclaim, prominence, and respect. You must die to your desire to be in control. You must die to your hope for independent righteousness. You must die to your plans for others. You must die to your cravings for a certain lifestyle or that particular location. You must die to your own kingship. You must die to the pursuit of your own glory in order to take up the cause of the glory of Another. You must die to your control over your own time. You must die to your maintenance of your own reputation. You must die to having the final answer and getting your own way. You must die to your unfaltering confidence in you. You must die.” Paul Tripp

12. What are you meditating upon?

Phil. 4:8  Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

The list could go on and on. What can you change? What do you need to surrender?