I’ve heard this phrase a few times in a training we are going through right now at our church. ”I don’t obey to be accepted, I obey BECAUSE I’m accepted”. That statement sticks in my head and is really the basis for how I explain my attempt to always obey God.
I don’t feel obligated, I don’t do it because I fear the wrath, I don’t do it because it’s a list I need to check off, I don’t do it to feel good about myself and I don’t do it so people or God will think I’m “good”. I do it because I’m so grateful to God for accepting me into his family. Even after all the things I’ve done in my life to try and screw things up, He was always there waiting to accept me. He loves me so much and that is why I obey.
I still screw up daily, but on a much smaller scale than before I began a relationship with God and started following Jesus. Before I became a Christian, I remember thinking that I wasn’t sure I could follow all the Christian “rules” and that it seemed boring. Ha! God was probably laughing, because what He has shown me since is how boring and empty my life was before Him. I was so focused on myself, and what society thinks, that I never felt happy or joyful inside. I searched and searched for something or someone to make me happy.
There is only one way to find true joy, and that is through Jesus Christ. He is the only way. I have learned that from my own experience, not because someone told me, or because I read it in the Bible. I’ve experienced the love, acceptance, forgiveness and Grace of God through Jesus and I’ll be eternally grateful.
It’s through that complete gratefulness that I CHOOSE to obey God. In doing so, He reveals Himself to me in ways I never would’ve imagined.
The Christian way of living, following Christ is ANYTHING but boring.
