Why obedience is important

   1 Samuel 12:14
   If you will fear the LORD and serve Him, and listen to His voice and not rebel against the command of the LORD, then both you and also the king who reigns over you will follow the LORD your God.

   Obedience is huge. We look at the New Testament and we know that God's redemption has switched from the law to mercy, salvation, and grace. But when we look at this in the wrong light we can miss some things that God still places a great emphasis on such as the fear of the Lord, service, and obedience. Those principles have not changed, but what empowers us to do these things has.

  
   The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, says proverbs, and it is so true. The fear of the Lord is a healthy recognition of the depth of holiness and power that our God has. I do not fear His presence, because He is my Father. But I do understand that not until heaven will my mind be able to comprehend all of who God is. Even the angels, who have been with Him through all of eternity, still stand around His throne crying Holy, Holy, Holy! without ceasing.

   Our healthy fear of God starts in worship. We honor Him for who He is. If the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, then worship is our classroom.

   When reading this today the Holy Spirit impressed on me that serving, in this scripture, came before hearing. You may not hear God when you have a choice to make. As frustrating as this is, He is teaching you two things. Firstly, He is reminding you of what He looks like. When you are facing a choice between doors 1,2, and 3 and God isn't telling you which to walk through, can I suggest that one of those doors looks more like God than the others? That one of those options is more in line with what He has already spoken into your life?

   Second, partnership. You see God doesn't need us to be God. But He has loved us so much that He has made the world vulnerable to the partnership that we have with Him. He will not accomplish things without us, He decided that. So one of the lessons He teaches us is that we are allowed to dream with God, to follow Him by doing what we have always dreamed of doing because some of those dreams are His that He has placed inside of His children. What Father would encourage His child to dream and then crush those dreams when they begin to pursue them?

   The fear of the Lord and service prepare your heart for obedience. Obedience is important because a rebellious heart may be able to hear the voice of the Lord, but it will always miss it's target. God does not speak the depths of His heart into a disobedient heart because that heart can never wrap itself around His truth. Perfection does not ask chaos to carry out His will. When our heart is in rebellion, it is in a state of anarchy and chaos. Rebellion is as a sin of witchcraft the bible says. Witchcraft is us surrendering our will to something or someone other than God.

   Obedience is not the requirement of a legalistic God who with holds favor based on how hard you work. Obedience is necessary to know the perfect will of God. If God spoke a word to a rebellious heart that demanded obedience, then that word would crush them because they would not have the ability to carry it out. "I have failed God again" they might say. This would cause more pain and destruction in their lives. God with holds things from rebellious hearts for their own good.

   Know how awesome God is, serve Him out of friendship, and obey His voice. This is what following Him looks like.

A contradiction of realities...

Exodus 3:1-4.

    Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. ² And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. ³ And Moses said, “I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.” ⁴ When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.”

   All through Moses' life there were contradictions. He was born a slave and  became a prince. Babies were wiped out by Pharaoh for fear of a great leader, but Moses was sent away and saved by the family of Pharaoh and tutored by a powerful leader. He was a prince who became a murderer for a race of slaves. All very strong contradictions. And here Moses stands, being ushered into his destiny, by another contradiction. A bush, on fire, and not destroyed.

   I am amazed at how often God uses something that should be falling apart to rescue me. How He takes what seems to be the insignificant and turns it into the most important thing in my life. I think that something as lowly as a scrub brush on the side of a mountain would be a poor billboard for the great leader of an entire nation.

   The idea was to show Moses another reality. In Moses' reality when a bush was on fire it was consumed. But when a bush was on fire in God's reality not only does it not burn, but it talks to you. A snake is not a staff, but in God's reality a staff is a snake and a warning to the greatest military power in the world to release it's slaves.

   In your reality you shouldn't be able to pay your bills. Your sickness should not leave. Your home should not sell. Your family should fall apart. Your calling should never happen. Your happiness wont return. You should be depressed, weary, struggling, broken, pitiful, self absorbed, fearful, or weak. 

   But God's reality looks very much different. He may not have broken your life, maybe you did that all on your own. But your brokenness is His bush. And as on fire as you might feel, you are a sign and a wonder to the world because you are not consumed.  And more than this, you are being led into His perfect purpose for your life.

  The only difference between a bush in the middle of the desert and a bush that fulfills the perfect will of God is the Presence of Someone who radiates purpose and wonder. You, little lonely scrub brush, can inspire nations if you let that fire rest on you.