OBEDIENCE

In this very outset, I would like to give my sincere thanks to the worship committee for giving me this opportunity and the almighty God, who sustain my life till this far. This morning my preaching may not be academically sound since I’m a little bit free from academic pressure.

 

Shall we pray?

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my rock and my Redeemer.

As we are meditating upon the theme Obedience for this week, I also prepared my sermon on this topic.

Firstly, let us see the Old Testament and New Testament concept of Obedience.

1.     The Old Testament Conception: The highest significance of the usage of Obedience in the Old Testament is that of the relationship of man to God. Obedience is the supreme test of faith in God and reverence for Him. The Old Testament conception of obedience was vital. It was the one important relationship which must not be broken. While sometimes this relation may have been formal and cold, it nevertheless was the one strong tie which held the people close to God.

2.     The New Testament Conception: In the New Testament a higher spiritual and moral relation is sustained than in the Old Testament. The importance of obedience is just as greatly emphasized. The test of fellowship with Yahweh in the Old Testament is obedience. The bond of union with Christ in the New Testament is obedience through faith, by which they become identified and the believer becomes a disciple.

Now, let us look some of the cost of obedience from the Bible:

1.     Shame/dishonor: We all know the story of the birth of Jesus. This morning I’m not going to preach a Christmas sermon…but when ever I think about the story, the obedience of Mary always touch my heart.

We know Mary was foretold that she will bore a baby. I used to think that how difficult it will be to accept the word of God for Mary. When the angel spoke to her, Mary was not having a husband. She was engaged with Joseph. At that very situation Mary might think about how her neighbors will murmured upon her if she conceived a baby. She might also consider that how Joseph’s family will think that. Yes, bearing a child without knowing the father by an engaged woman is a shameful thing. I have no doubt that Mary also considered everything before she said “Be it to me according to thy word”. But, for the birth of Jesus Christ, Messiah, Mary obeyed the word of God by receiving all those disrespect and shame.

2.     The cost of obedience is loss: If we look the story of Abraham, we can imagine that how much he paid for obeying the word of God. Abram or Abraham was called when he was 75 years old. Though it is not clearly written in the Bible we can assume that an old man with wife would surely be settled everything in his place. As they are agro based society he might have field or cattle. But he was called to leave everything behind. Let us imagine that if we were Abraham, how will we answered the calling of God, we may find very difficult to accept the word of God. But, Abraham obeyed the word of God by losing his parents, his kindred, and all his belongings.

After he left his country, God asked him to sacrifice his only son for burnt offering. After leaving everything, asking his only son, we may think that this is too much. But Abraham still accepted the word of God. Yes, to obey the word of God, we have to loss many things. We have to loss our Job, our high status, benefit and all…

3.     Self-Emptiness: To obey the word of God, kenosis, emptiness of self is also another prerequisite. If we read Philippians 2 we see that Jesus emptied himself to obey the word of God. ⁶who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, ⁷but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, ⁸he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death— even death on a cross. To save sinful human beings, God had a planned to sacrifice his only begotten son. For Jesus Christ denying himself by surrendering his divinity and taking the form of slave and born in human likeness was not an easy task.  But he obeyed his father even up to death, death on the cross.

My dear brother and sister, this morning let us consider ourselves again how far we are obedient? We may claim that we are a committed person, but without obeying the word of God commitment or sacrifice only is not enough. Samuel said that obedience is better than sacrifice. This is very true. We are called not only to be a pastor, a missionary, but to obey the word of God. Here in this place or in our near future, God may want us to do something for him. If we look only ourselves, we will surely find many reasons not to obey the word of God. We have to remember that in order to be obedient there may be a time when we have to lose something, sometimes we may have to do some shameful things, or we may need to deny ourselves.

But I want to make sure that obedience never end only in a bad condition. Rather obedience always bears fruit for our good at the end. Let me bring out some reward of obedience.

1.     Firstly obedience returns in happiness: As we see in Luke chapter 1:48, when Mary obeyed the word of God, she was filled with happiness and she was rejoiced in the Lord. Yes, sometimes we may think that obedience cost hardship. But, it always ends with happiness.

2.     Secondly, Obedience brings blessings: The story of Abraham reminds us that obedience bring many blessings. On his way to the Promised Land Abraham was blessed with cattle, silver and Gold. And God gave him a son from his barren wife and became the father of a great nation. They even call him father of faith.

3.     And Thirdly, obedience brings healing: I hope we all know the story of Naaman which is from 2. Kings 5. 1 – 27. Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Aram, was a great man and in high favor with his master, because by him the Lord had given victory to Aram. The man, though a mighty warrior, suffered from leprosy. He learned that there was a man of God named Elisha who could heal his leprosy. So, he went to him and asked him to cure his leprosy. So, Elisha told Namaan to go and wash in the Jordan river seven times. But, Naaman was very angry and went away. Washing in the river Seven times was not a difficult task, but for a man like him, what Elisha said to him was just like making fun of him. But after that, his servant asked him to do what a man of God said to him, so Naaman immersed himself seven times in the Jordan and he became clean. Yes, sometimes very difficult to understand what God has spoken to us, but just obeying himself is a healing for us.

4.     Obedience brings spiritual insight: If we sincerely choose to do God’s will, it is not difficult to determine what His will is. From human side we may see difficulties but obeying the will of God brings spiritual insight that can help us through.

5.     Obedience also brings life: The obedience of Jesus to his father brings us life. Because of the sin Adam and Eve we all are death. We were separated from God, but Jesus obeyed God that brings us life. And, to share that life we have to obey God. Our obedience is nit only for ourselves; it can also bring life for other.

While we are pondering upon obedience, I feel very important to share what can be happened if we disobeyed God. We see many people who disobey God in the Bible. If wee carefully examine the live of those who disobey God, we can see that God never spared who disobeyed him. The Bible says that son who disobeyed God will not see life but the wrath of God abide on him. So, if we disobeyed God, the punishment will surely come to us.

In 1^st Samuel we see that Saul was appointed as a king by God to invade Amalek. But Saul disobeyed what God has spoken to him, and God really repent that he had made Saul for the king of Israel and he turned away from Saul. So, friends, we came here by obeying the voice of God, but let us remember that as soon as we disobeyed God, God will surely turn away from us.

Lastly, what I want to mentioned is to obey the word of God we should disobeyed ourselves.  Sometimes, we always give more important to our desire than the voice of God. But, to glorify the name of God and to extent his Kingdom, God want us to listen him, to hear him and to obey his command. May God bless us all.