Category: Christian Life Page 6 of 9

[Note: this is a continuing part of a series reproducing a sermon. An explanation can be found here.]

Even if we know that obedience is important, and know where to find the commands and how to understand them, really, what might we be looking for? What does the obedient Christian look like?

It may be that we need to adjust our answer to that a bit. We color that answer with reference to external matters when in reality the essence of obedience is really internal.

III. Obedience is motivated by love aiming to Christ-likeness.

Jesus does not simply say ‘do what I say’. He says that, of course. But that is not all he says. He begins and ends obedience with himself. It is not obedience that defines the Christian life. It is, rather, Jesus.

If we are not careful we will miss his emphases. Notice how he himself is prominent in this statement:

If you love ME, you will keep MY commandments. (15)

The Christian life begins and ends with Jesus, meaning first that

A. Obedience is motivated by love.

In the same way we’ve made the case that love is not mere sentiment, so we must make the case that obedience is not mere mechanics. It is possible to obey without love. And that is not the Christian life. Surely it is inadequate to say one loves and then not obey. But it is as well inadequate to obey without love.

To generalize, we are to be neither poets nor engineers.

The poet loves deeply with his affections and is free-spirited in his actions; the engineer is precise in his actions, and challenged in his affections.

The Christian is to be both a lover who obeys and a follower who loves deeply the one he follows. It is possible to be a great doer, and a poor lover and a great lover and a poor doer.

It is love for Jesus that motivates obedience, and it is the love from Jesus that stimulates love for him. It all starts and ends with HIM.

If obedience is a struggle, the first remedy is not to try harder at doing. Oh, we may need to try harder, of course. But that is not where we start. If obedience is a struggle, the root problem is the heart. We first need to address our love. I may lack the strength to obey because my heart has not been moved to worship and love.

The first step toward obedience, whether my own, or my children, or my church, is to have my and their hearts turned back toward Jesus. To hear again the gospel of his love for me is what stirs the dim affections of my heart. And then, loving him, I will have greater strength to keep HIS commandments.

If you love ME, you will keep MY commandments. (15)

Obedience is motivated by love – it begins and ends with Jesus.

[Note: this is a continuing part of a series reproducing a sermon. An explanation can be found here.]

Obedience, I should add, then is something we grow into.

Imagine a father who took his two year old son aside to tell him what was expected of him in life.

“Son,” he says, “There are a number of things which you need to attend to as you go through life – things that will contribute to your life and happiness.” And for the next week without stop he lectures the son on all the rules that we as adults take for granted.

About day five, he’s addressing plagiarism and how he should never give his schoolwork to another to copy. This is something everyone should know, so he lays it out. For his two year old.

Midway through day six he’s explaining the rules for when and where he should stop for a school bus and other emergency vehicles. Life is full of rules, and so to succeed in life this two year old needs to know them.

Ridiculous, of course.

Children grow into obedience. They grow into ‘doing the right thing’, learning what that is in the context of living, with parental instruction and guidance. That is, they learn it in community.

We similarly grow into obedience – we grow in our understanding as we grow, through the Scriptures and through, quite literally, the company we keep. I don’t expect a toddler to keep all the food on the table, but a fifteen year old had better. Through regular participation in the community and in worship and in the Word, we learn obedience as we grow.

[Note: this is a continuing part of a series reproducing a sermon. An explanation can be found here.]

If we can’t trust our hearts to be a sure compass for God-honoring behavior, can we trust ourselves to be a sure interpreter of Scripture? Nope. So, obedience which is discovered by Scripture must be understood and applied in community.

B. Obedience is understood in community.

We need a community of Bible saturated and Jesus loving people to help us apply Scripture to our lives. We were not meant to learn obedience alone.

Once upon a time there was a woman tempted to act, to follow her heart. And so she acted apart from the community that God had given her. Her name was Eve and she did not bother to consult with Adam before eating the fruit that looked so good to her. The consequences were disastrous.

Community is essential to wrestling through the question of obedience.

The Apostle Peter was a recovering racist. For most of his life, the Gentiles were dogs and he would never eat with them. But God gave him a vision which helped him understand that the Gospel removed the barrier between him and the Gentiles.

But his racism would creep back in, and on at least one occasion, he needed Paul to get in his face to remind him that his racist choices were not in obedience to Jesus.

Obedience is something that is directed by Scripture, but worked out practically in community.

Living the Christian life requires more than a Bible. It requires a wise and godly Christian community. In Colossians 3 Paul tells us to

“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly…,”

We read this as a command for us to become individually biblically literate. But that is not his goal. His desire is that the Christian community may minister wisdom and grace to one another:

…teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. (Colossians 3:16)

Obedience is comprehended in community.

False teaching – whether it is Eve’s raw disobedience or false asceticism or cultic practices – will always follow a strategy of divide and conquer. False teaching isolates a single sheep, or a group of like thinking sheep, and can then pour its poisonous vision into them. We must resist that.

The community we inhabit is a community stretching back 2000 years and embracing a world 25,000 miles in circumference. Understanding that alone will help us gain a better picture of many commands. But as well will the counsel and insight of the culturally sensitive and godly communities God has placed us in now.

We are, for example, told to love our neighbor. But what does that mean by way of application? We learn the answer in community. Does it mean I help my neighbor move his brother in with him? Does it mean I help him move his girlfriend in with him? What does it mean?

Such a question cannot be considered outside the context of our broad community.

When I’ve lost all bearings, when my supports have crashed, when I’m lost, I need community to help take me by the hand in the midst of my fear and confusion to know what Scripture would require of me.

Obedience is mediated through Scripture and through community.

[Note: this is a continuing part of a series reproducing a sermon. An explanation can be found here.]

Obedience is a part of the Christian life, but it does not define the Christian life. But even when we get these things straight, we still are left wondering WHAT to obey. There is no shortage of those willing to volunteer their expertise on this matter. So, where do we find clarity on what to obey? Again, we need to grapple with two critical components:

II. Obedience is directed by Scripture and understood in community.

When Jesus says, “You will keep my commandments…” it is natural to ask, “What are his commandments?”

In an article about NCAA sports, it is mentioned that an Oklahoma State baseball player a few years ago was suspended for violating “NCAA Bylaw 12.3.2.1”. We easily wonder if the “Jesus Code of Obedience” is so precisely defined. For some of us, it is.

Clearly, though, if it is Jesus’s commandments that we are to obey, then to find them we must find them in the only place where his words are recorded.

A. Obedience is discovered in Scripture.

The commandments are the words of Jesus. They are the imperatives that Jesus gives such as this:

“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.” (John 13:34)

But Jesus does not break it down, does he? There is no “Jesus Bylaw on love: 12.3.2.1” His law is clear, but its application something to be worked out.

Elsewhere, he says this:

“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28)

His commands speak of acting in a certain way, but they also speak to how we respond to him. To ‘act’ is obedience; to ‘rest’ is obedience. Both point to paths of obedience. But with both, the application is daunting. The obedience that is discovered in Scripture – both Old and New Testaments – covers all of life.

Locating the norm of obedience in the Scriptures is important because we otherwise have unreliable moral compasses. I think back to the day that I was sitting with a friend who was actively in the process of leaving his wife and pursuing a relationship with another woman. He found it easy to dismiss my cautions, because he was, he said, following his heart.

If I break that down, it meant that he was conforming his life to his inward desires. He was trusting his heart which the Scriptures themselves say is not to be trusted. It is broken, it is deceitful, it is often blind. It is in the Bible where the commandments of Jesus are given by which obedience is to be measured. Our inward desires are not to be trusted.

I’m always impressed when someone who has let his passions get the best of him is willing to own that and confess his wrong. Barry Bales‘ day job is as the bassist Alison Krauss’s band Union Station. In his spare time, among other things, he is a rabid fan of the University of Tennessee athletic teams. He is an active Twitter user (@BarryBales) and likes to have fun tweeting his reactions to the game. Apparently, he was convicted by the nature of his tweets last night, and posted this:

My apologies if I was too harsh toward any particular players during last night’s UT/ALA game. It’s just what we Vol fans (or any other school’s hardcore fans) do. We love and are passionate about the football team/program/school. Therefore we are passionate about winning. We love the Vols and expect them to be able to do great things. Often times forgetting that they are college kids. Students first, athletes second. It’s not cool to be ugly toward college kids for not winning a football game. To be disappointed or even heartbroken, that’s cool. To question coaching staffs or administrators, that’s fine. To throw things at the tv and yell and scream, ok by me. But at least wait til the players are Pros and getting paid millions of dollars before you (or I) get too down on them.
Just wanted to qualify some of last night’s Tweets. Thanks. Go Vols!

There’s character, there. A godly Christian life is not one in which we never fail. It is rather owning our wrong when we do. Thank you, Mr. Bales, for showing us how.

Oops.

I have been, as you may know, serializing a sermon preached a few weeks ago. I just realized this morning that in so doing, I dropped out a piece. I don’t think it leaves a big gap in the flow and logic of the whole, but its absence bothers me.

So, I have posted it, in its proper location, though this means that two installments appeared on one day. This should complete it.

Sorry about that!

[Note: this is a continuing part of a series reproducing a sermon. An explanation can be found here.]

Obedience is a part of the Christian life – as obedience was a part of the life of Jesus, joyfully performed as a response of love.

But…

B. Obedience does not define the Christian life.

We are not justified in saying that the Christian life is the same as obeying Jesus and keeping the law. It is bigger than that. The Christian life is no more equated with obedience than heel and sit adequately define a dog’s life. A dog is all about jumping up on his owner’s lap, and corralling the kids in the back yard.

Certainly, a dog obeys – but that is not what makes a dog. And it is not what makes a Christian.

A few years ago there was a big fad among Christians to put “Ten Commandments” signs in their yard or on their car. I felt that this was in one way an attempt to ‘stick it to’ the secular culture that found such things offensive. But when we identify ourselves as Christians by putting lists of rules in our yards, what does that communicate to the world? It simply confirms what the world already assumes, that Christianity is about legal compliance. But it is not.

The Bible is a story of God’s love for his people and the extent to which he would go to prove that love. It is not about the rules.

The Christian life is a life of love of which obedience is the fruit, not the other way around.

If we can get this straight, then the Christian life will be much more joyful! Obedience is a part of the Christian life, but it does not define the Christian life.

[Note: this is a continuing part of a series reproducing a sermon. An explanation can be found here.]

In grappling with the place of obedience in the Christian life, the first thing to understand is that

I. Obedience is a part of the Christian life, but does not define the Christian life.

Living as a disciple of Jesus is something that has many layers, not one. The Christian life is not just ‘doing good’. A Christian is someone who sees himself as a part of God’s story, the story of sin and fall and redemption, who is trusting in Jesus’ work as that which brings him into a renewed and reconciled relationship with God.

And this passage reminds us that our hope is rooted in Jesus, and is lived out through anticipation of his return and through an intimate relationship with God. And this relationship with God is lived out through prayer, through the gift of the Holy Spirit, through love, and 
through obedience. This is all a part of this chapter. Clearly, obedience is a part of the Christian life, but does not define the Christian life. And both of these propositions we need to hold onto.

A. Obedience is a part of the Christian life.

When Paul says that we are ‘under grace, not under law’ he is not saying that there is no law to which the Christian life should conform. By grace Christ saves us and by grace he changes us, and his commandments are integral to both of those actions.

We see this in John’s writings as well. Grace is central in John as we see Jesus giving his life out of love for his unworthy friends. And it is grace as well by which Jesus reveals his care for those for whom he would die by giving them direction in how they might live.

And so he says

If you love me, you will keep my commandments. (15)

Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. (20)

If anyone loves me, he will keep my word (23)

Whoever does not love me does not keep my words (24)

Commandments and grace go together in our relationship with Jesus just as they did in Jesus’ relationship with his Father. The love between the first and second member of the Trinity is nothing we can adequately fathom, but that gracious relationship was in no way hindered by an expectation of obedience.

Jesus says, “And the word that you hear is not mine but the Father’s who sent me.” (24) Jesus, deeply loved by the Father, did not act on his own, but did whatever the Father told him. In fact, he acts in this way because he loves the Father.

“I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father.” (31)

A deep, free, grace filled love relationship is not somehow sullied or nullified by commandments and obedience.

Obedience is a part of the Christian life – as obedience was a part of the life of Jesus, joyfully performed as a response of love.

But…

[Note: this is a continuing part of a series reproducing a sermon. An explanation can be found here.]

To move toward the first half of the verse “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” is to begin to rest on the love of Jesus. That is a safe haven, and there is a lot to commend it. We begin to understand that “I will go to heaven because Jesus died on the cross for me and rose again from the dead. My obedience adds not one ounce to his merit. And my lack of obedience requires no more blood for it’s atonement.” This we embrace with relish.

But it becomes a hollow relish over time if we are not concerned with obedience. God in his gentle care knows that holiness and happiness go together. So, as a good father, he lets us walk down paths haunted by pain. Trouble creeps in, the supports fall away, and he re-directs us back to himself. That path back to him involves many things, and some of those we have addressed. But among them is obedience.

I understand the urge to close our hearts to obedience. But I also understand that God loves us too much to leave us there. If this passage teaches us anything, it teaches us that love for Jesus will incline us, will pull us, will move us, in the direction of wanting to obey.

There is a deep desire in each of you who truly love Jesus to obey. That desire is mingled with fear – with doubt – with uncertainty. I understand that. But since obedience is the fruit that those who love Jesus long to bear, Christians peer into Scripture seeking the next step in the path to joy.

[Note: this is a continuing part of a series reproducing a sermon. An explanation can be found here.]

Pride is not the only danger when obedience becomes our mistress. When we put too much weight on the second half of this ‘equation’, “If you love me, you will obey my commandments” the word ‘commandments’ will loom large to us. Next to the standard of obedience that represents, we will see the countless ways in which we do not measure up, and we will despair.

We will conclude that we have nothing to be proud of except our consciousness of failure. And we despair. Reformed and Presbyterian churches tend to foster this response. We will emphasize how unworthy we are of Christ’s favor, and that emphasis finds a resonant chamber in the heart of the sensitive conscience.

This leads to what I have called the Linda Ronstadt Effect. All the music of our heart is drowned out by the constantly looping refrain:

“You’re no good, you’re no good, you’re no good, Baby, you’re no good.”

It is a song we can’t turn off, and the longer it plays, the more we despair. We come to the Bible, and all we can see is the Law, and the Law exposes our sin, and we despair. We’re no good.

And the more we despair, the more we avoid others. The more we despair, the more distant and elusive becomes joy. We become somber and dull (oops!) and our testimony disappears into negativity. Who wants to become a Christian if it means the weight of despair? We become the Eeyore’s of the Christian menagerie, when we should have the exuberance of Tigger.

Eventually the despair can become so great that we give up. Grateful for the grace of the gospel, we move slowly and slyly to put the weight on the first half of the equation. “Jesus loves me; I love Jesus.” Anything more, we conclude, is just TOO hard to figure out, and so we don’t. I can’t keep the commandments and so I’m not even going to try.

Such is the path of pride and despair. But somewhere, somehow, we know there must be something better.