By Yodit Kifle Smith

​"For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and
His commandments are not burdensome..."
(1 John 5:3)
 
Think back to when you were a child and you were told do a chore around the house. Did you do it right away to the best of your ability or did you, like me, wait until the last minute and was just glad that it was over? I don’t know if I can honestly say that as a child, I obeyed only because I loved my parents and it gave me joy to obey. I think, more often than not, I obeyed to simply be compliant and for the obvious reason of not getting disciplined (aka spanked).

Why and how we obey speaks volumes about us. As children of God, we are commanded to obey Him. A life of obedience to His Word and His ways is what identifies us as His children. “The one who says, ‘I have come to know Him,’ and does not keep His commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him…” (1 John 2: 4) However, it can become very easy to obey God simply out of compliance and not love for Him. Compliance isn’t rooted in authentic relationship based on love. It’s more of a distant relationship based on fear. And not the reverential fear of God that Scripture talks about, but a fear that is tainted by the outcome of punishment. A fear that thinks more highly of the approval of man than the glory of God. Compliant obedience is not about the desire to obey as much as it’s the outcome if I don’t obey. The Pharisees in the New Testament "obeyed" God. But we find that their obedience came out of the desire to look righteous before others than to be pleasing to God (Matthew 23). As believers, this pattern is exhausting. It’s not sustainable. It will drive us away from God because it has not allowed us to taste the joy that treasures Christ and His work in our lives and the joy that comes from our obedience to Him.

Obedience that flows from love and delight in God isn’t exhausting. The Psalmist describes the joy and sustenance that obeying God’s word brings all throughout Psalm 119. This kind of obedience isn’t tainted by the fear of outcome. In fact, this obedience knows that we can’t obey God on our own strength. In and of ourselves, we aren’t bent towards obedience; rather, disobedience.  It’s the work of the Holy Spirit in us to desire obedience to God. It’s reliant on the grace that comes only from Him-a sustained grace that is received from knowing Him and wanting to know Him more.

Where has your obedience been coming from lately? Have you found it coming from a compliant place? Are you reading the Word of God out of obligation and legality or can you like the Psalmist say, “Oh how I love Your law! It is my meditation all the day” (Psalm 119:97).  Are you saying you forgive with your words but keeping unforgiveness in your heart because you don’t trust God to be your vengeance? Has going to church become a Sunday thing to cross off your list? Has serving become a chore?

If we find ourselves in any of those places, the prayer is that God would restore the joy of our salvation and uphold us with a willing spirit (Psalm 51:12). May we be reminded of the love He has shed within our hearts (Romans 5:5) so that we would overflow with obedience to please Him. May we find rest in the truth of His Word that His commandments are not burdensome. May we ask the Lord to lift our eyes a little higher to see Christ and treasure Him. May our obedience be the result of rooted joy in our faith. 
 
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The weekly devotionals seek to encourage you to dig deeper into Scripture as you take the time to daily read, meditate, and internalize the verses in the devotional, along with the passages provided below to give greater context. Take the time to read them throughout the week (repetition is important) and ask the Holy Spirit to help you grasp what God is showing you about Himself, about you, and how to live in light of these truths. 

Passages to read/memorize/meditate:
Psalm 51:12
Psalm 119 (highly encourage you to take the time to read this whole chapter)
Matthew 23
Luke 11:28
John 14:15
Romans 5:5
1 John 2:4
1 John 5:3
2 John 1:6

 
Questions to reflect on:
1.     How have you been approaching your obedience to God lately?
2.     If you have found that you are being compliant instead of joyful in obeying, where do you feel the change began?
3.     How have you seen the difference in your life when you are being compliant in obedience VS. joyful in obedience?
 

By Yodit Kifle Smith 

“Well done good and faithful servant…"(Matthew. 25:23)
 
Aren’t these the words we want stringed together at the end of our lives as we stand before our Righteous and Holy God?
 
These are also the words we should want to hear daily. 
 
Faithfulness is daily.
 
Our walk with the Lord and in the Lord doesn’t promise us earthly benefits. This path will be one with warfare and struggles, but He assures us of the joy that awaits us when we will be forever in His presence, no longer susceptible to brokenness and pain. What great Hope!
 
It’s this Hope that pushes us to be faithful. It’s what allows us to “count it all joy when we face hardships and various trials, knowing that the testing of our faith produces endurance, and letting that endurance have its perfect result so that we may be perfect and complete lacking in nothing” (James 1: 2-4).
 
The truth is, we don’t drift into faithfulness. We must daily choose to intentionally fix and gaze our eyes on Christ, the author and perfecter of our Faith (Hebrews 12:2).
 
Faithfulness looks like opening our Word when everything in our flesh wants to sleep more or get other things done. It looks like walking towards those we disagree with even though it’s easier to have nothing to do with them. It looks like lovingly serve those who don’t always acknowledge your labor. It looks like uttering words of desperation in prayer when cynicism would rather keep your words to yourself.
 
And God delights in our faithfulness.
 
We live in a world that is allergic to faithfulness. If something doesn’t feel good or it’s uncomfortable, then just move on to the next thing. If it’s not feeding your desires, why stick with it? Why struggle when there are so many options to experience freedom? This is the stream we have to swim up against. While faithfulness doesn’t come naturally to us, it’s a daily exercise that is built as we rely on the Holy Spirit to draw us nearer to God.
 
One of the ways our faithfulness to Him strengthens is by focusing on His faithfulness to us. His Word reminds us that when we were deep in our sin, having no desire to know Him or love Him, He died for us (Romans 5:8).  He extended His grace and mercy when we didn’t (and never will) deserve it. What’s more astounding is that He is faithful to us even when we are not faithful to Him because He can’t deny who He is (2 Timothy 2:13). It’s His character to be faithful. This shows us that it was never on the basis of our works or our faithfulness to Him that allowed us to encounter such love. It has always and will always be about Him. He can’t go against who He is. This is encouraging to our faith.
 
We are quick to associate His faithfulness to us based on our faithfulness to Him, leaving us in an unstable relationship with the Lord. We lack the true peace and joy that is assured in Him when we are constantly looking at our relationship with Him like our human relationships. We must realize that God is not man that He should lie. For those of us who love and fear Him, He doesn’t deal with us according to our unfaithfulness (Psalm 103:10) because if that was the case, He wouldn’t have dealt with us at all. He deals with us according to His loving-kindness. According to His love. According to His faithfulness. We need to rest in these Truths.
 
His faithfulness conforms us to His image, sanctifying us in Him so that our lives will grow brighter and clearer in representing Him.
 
May we treasure His faithfulness to us. His Word is filled with the richness of every faithful promise to those who love and fear Him. May we treasure those in our lives who are faithful to Him. They are ones whom we should look to and glean from. Their faithfulness is a testament to His goodness and never-ending love. May we pursue to emulate that faithfulness as we grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ (Colossians 1:10).
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------The weekly devotionals seek to encourage you to dig deeper into Scripture as you take the time to daily read, meditate, and internalize the verses in the devotional, along with the passages provided below to give greater context. Take the time to read them throughout the week (repetition is important) and ask the Holy Spirit to help you grasp what God is showing you about Himself, about you, and how to live in light of these truths. 

Passages to read/memorize/meditate:


Psalm 103: 10
Romans 5
James 1:2-4
Hebrews 12:2
Galatians 6
Colossians 1:10
2 Timothy 2:13
 Questions to Reflect on:
1. Write down the ways in which you have seen God’s faithfulness over your life.
 
 2. How have you remained faithfulness to the Lord? What makes it easy or hard to do so?
 
3. Take this week to meditate on the Scriptures (Like the ones above and others) that show you and remind you of God’s faithfulness to you.