Today, as I was reading, pondering, and meditating, it struck me just how simple the will of God is...how uncomplicated the daily Christian walk is...how straightforward our relationship with our Heavenly Father is.
It really is.
In my analytical, type-A mind, I tend to complicate it all and make it so much loftier and harder than it actually is. I also tend to leave Christ Himself out of the equation and place the Christian life and the responsibility of the relationship all on my shoulders. When I leave everything up to me, I only get more discouraged, frustrated, and disturbed at my utter failures and inadequacies.
I can’t live the Christian life on my own. That much I know. Lately, the Lord has been gently reminding me how true this statement is and how desperately I need to simply turn my eyes on Him.
In her classic The God Of All Comfort, Hannah Whitall Smith writes, “The power for victory and endurance are to come from looking to Jesus and considering Him. When we look at ourselves, we see nothing but ourselves and our own weakness, poverty, and sin. We do not and cannot see the remedy and supply for these, and we are defeated.”
I don’t want to live a life of defeat and frustration. I want the victorious, abundant life that Christ offers.
The essence of the Christian life is so simple: placing my complete trust in my infinitely kind, caring Savior and showing my love for Him by implicit obedience to His will. His Spirit provides the strength as I yield to His work in my life.
Phillip Keller defines faith as “my personal, positive response to the Word of God, to the point where I act in quiet trust.” It is not a wishy-washy faith, but a trust that flings itself fully and wholly upon the One who cannot change, cannot fail, and cannot lie.
But we cannot trust One we do not know. Keller points out that our response is to the Word of God. When we read His Word, we learn Who our God is. We discover He is infinitely kind, merciful, faithful, powerful, sovereign, omniscient, omnipresent, eternal, beautiful, good, and perfect love.
Hannah Whitall Smith writes, “The only road to Christlikeness is to behold His goodness and beauty. We grow like what we look at, and if we spend our lives looking at our hateful selves, we will become more and more hateful. Looking at self, we are more and more changed into the image of self. While on the contrary, if we spend our time letting our minds dwell on God’s goodness and love and trying to drink in His Spirit, the inevitable result will be that we will be changed into the image of the Lord.”
When we know Who our God is, we can trust Him completely and we will desire to do what He asks – what will please Him. Obedience cannot help but follow a true knowledge of God. “Love for Christ is a deliberate setting of the will to carry out His commands at any cost. It is the delight of accomplishing our Father’s highest purposes, no matter how challenging. The end result of such conduct is to bring sweet satisfaction to the Good Shepherd. Because of such single-minded service we sense His approval of our behavior. We know of a surety that we are loved and appreciated” (Phillip Keller, Lessons from a Sheep Dog). He reinforces this point again in a different chapter: “Our love for God is demonstrated in implicit obedience to His will, expressed in our loving cooperation with His commands.”
What does God command us to do? How do we know what His will for us is? We go back to the Scriptures to learn what He requires of us.
“‘And you shall
love the Lord your God with all your
heart and with all
your soul and with all your mind
and with all your
strength.’ This is the first commandment.
And the second,
like it, is this: ‘You shall love your
neighbor as
yourself.’ There is no other commandment
greater than
these.”
– Mark 12: 30-31
“I beseech you
therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God,
that ye present
your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable
unto God, which is
your reasonable service. And be not
conformed to the
world: but be ye transformed by
the renewing of your mind that ye may prove
what is that
good, and
acceptable, and perfect will of God.”
– Romans 12:1-2
At a recent Bible conference I attended, one of the
speakers pointed out the simplicity of the will of God and how plainly it is
stated in Scripture. Below is his summary of the will of God and the
corresponding verses:
§
Progress
in sanctification: “For this is the will of God, even your sanctification,
that ye should abstain from fornication: that every one of you should know how
to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour” (I Thessalonians 4:3).
§
Submission
to the authority over you: “Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for
the Lord’s sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme; or unto governors, as
unto them that are sent by Him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the
praise of them that do well. For so is the will of God, that with well doing ye
may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men” (I Peter 2:13-15).
§
Giving
thanks: “In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ
Jesus concerning you” (I Thessalonians 5:18).
§
Stand
strong in suffering: “Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will
of God commit the keeping of their souls to Him in well doing, as unto a
faithful Creator” (I Peter 4:19).
If we are faithfully reading His Word, praying, and
obeying these clear elements of His will for our lives, we can trust Him to
faithfully guide us and further reveal His will to us. In other words, how
could you expect God to show His will for something in your life – career,
spouse, ministry – if you refuse to obey the parts of His will that are written
out specifically in His Word?
One hymn writer summed up the Christian life in three
simple words: trust and obey. When we walk by faith each day in humble
obedience to His Word, we discover the secret of the abundant, victorious life
Christ offers us freely in John 10:10.
For there’s no other way
To be happy in Jesus,
But to trust and obey.
–
John Sammis
No comments:
Post a Comment