IBS week 6

Week 6: Obedience

Monday: John 14:15

If you love, me you will keep my commandments.

If we love Him being Jesus then we will keep His commandment this is referring to the covenant that God established to Israel. They however never seemed to keep Him commandments. The reason we should keep His commandments is not because we want to implement legalism on our lives but solely because we want our heavenly Father to dwell in us and us not fallowing his commandments is sinful and so that causes strife with God in our lives. One of the study notes that are written in my bible is True love manifest itself in willing obedience.

Today I will pray for 15 minutes about the areas in my Life that are causing strife with Him and repent of those things making my best efforts to remove them from my life.

Tuesday: Acts 5:29

But peter and the apostles answered, “We must obey God rather than men.

This passage is a very clear picture of boldness and confidence, which the apostles possess because of their confidence that they are doing is the will of their Father. Maybe the spirit prompts you to witness to someone in the supermarket we have a plethora of excuses to come up with that give ourselves reason to believe that the Spirit cannot actually mean for us to talk to that person. Or maybe the person you are trying to witness to is just too bad and they would never get saved. Well in this passage the Apostles are proclaiming truth to the very people that killed Jesus Christ. Peter was crossing every political and social rule by stating these things; not only that, but peter was speaking with the people who basically controlled his fate. The apostles were being summoned for essentially violating parole; previously the high priest strictly charged them to no longer teach of this name (Jesus) but the apostles filled all of Jerusalem with his teaching. That sounds kind of like violating parole. And so for peter to accuse the council of killing the Son of the Living God is very bold.

So in what way does this passage relate to obedience? Well the truth highlighted in 5:29 is very true, that we must obey God rather than man. In the surrounding passage peter demonstrates these things in the way he proclaims truth to the Sanhedrin. Peter is obeying the Lord to continuing to teach in the name of Jesus even while his is still in the presence of his accusers.  Although, some people may think his defense was in vain because later in the chapter all of the apostles are punished with the scourge, but more important than the punishment was the suffering that they endured but in vs. 41 it says the apostles left rejoicing. This show that the lord does work all things together for the good of those who love him (Romans 8:28); the way it works out for our good could very well be in causing us to suffer like Christ did but in the end we are able to count it all joy (verse where it says count it all joy my brothers when you face trials and tribulations.)

Today I will dwell on the areas that the Lord is sanctifying in me that I may find joy in those things.

Wednesday: Romans 6:16

But do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?

This verse and several of the other verses are clear that we all at one point were or are slaves to sin. (Romans 3:23) This is an incarnate condition of humanity. Henceforth we are all slaves of sin because we chose to serve sin which leads to death, instead of serving obedience which leads to righteousness. The game changer is in who I chose to serve I can be obedient to sin which leads me toward death or I can be obedient to God which leads me towards righteousness.

When the bible talks about being slaves to sin I am reminded of the times when I was addicted to pornography, for those five years I was a slave to sin. Lust was and is such a struggle for me. I constantly have to surrender my thoughts and desires to the Lord. Although I am not always successful in doing this I am no longer a slave to lust because I have chosen to become a slave of obedience by choosing to fallow Christ which has led to righteousness. The difference in my life now is that I have chosen and still choose to obey the Lord in my thought life and in the websites I spend my time on.

Application: Today, I will spend 10-15 minutes in prayer thanking him for the victory over this in my life and that I will continue to pursue purity.

 Thursday: Eph. 6:1 & Col 3:20

Children obey your parents in the Lord for this is right.

Children obey your parents in everything for this pleases the Lord.

The Bible is very clear that we’re to obey our parents. The fifth commandment states Honor your Father and Mother. So this is clearly an important concept as it is stated so many times. But why is this important? Is it only because our parents have our best interest in mind and so we need to heed their wisdom? Well that certainly is an important part of Children obey your parents. Hand in hand with this verse is the verse that states “Do everything without complaining or arguing.”

However even further than this is the lesson that I need to obey authority. I am naturally very rebellious and that is a sign of my sinful nature because I always want to find a better way to do something. Far more often than not my rebellion will get me into trouble; back when I was around four years old I was in my mom’s bathroom with her as she was doing her hair. To a four year old boy it was fascinating to see all of the instruments and tools my mom used to do her hair, one of which being a curling iron. Well I knew I was not supposed to touch anything on my mom’s bathroom counter, but I decided that I wanted to see what was up there. Being a four year old I grabbed straight for the shiniest thing I could see the end of the curling iron…needless to say I got burned pretty bad I had wore a sock with an ice pack over my hand for the rest of the day.

Even deeper within this truth is the parallel that a child obeying their parents is the same way that our Heavenly Father instructs us to obey him. The nation of Israel learned this the hard way when they wandered for forty years in the wilderness. They definitely did not do all things without complaining or arguing. In fact in every couple of chapters it seems that the Israelites were complaining or arguing over something.

We as Christians are to obey our physical parents but even more importantly we need to obey our Heavenly Father. My application is that today I will spend time in prayer that I might be sensitive to the Spirit’s voice in my life and that I will obey Him when he is speaking to me. Also I will be more diligent when my physical parents instruct me to do something.

Friday: Heb. 13:17

Obey your leaders and submit to them for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you.

God has placed me under leaders in this program I need to heed what they ask me to do because in the end they have my best in mind. Not only the leaders above me need to do this though but I need to as well because I am a leader and I will give an account for all the instruction I gave, and I will account for the example I set through my own life. I realized this in my youth ministry. When I was approached by several Jr. Higher's parents and they thanked me for the example I was setting for their children. I always thought that the parents were just saying that to be nice, but then I began to observe how the youth group would behave when the leaders behaved differently.

Application: To pray for 10 minutes about humbling myself and submitting to the leaders and most importantly my Lord.