Can you honestly say that if God asked you to do anything, that you would actually do it? ANYTHING?!
My squad has decided to try to spend time studying similar topics each week and blogging about them. When someone mentioned the topic of obedience my first thought was, ‘HECK YEAH!!‘ Obedience has pretty much become the topic of my life over the last few weeks, and boy has it been a trying but exciting time!
Let me just share with you a little story of obedience that I have recently experienced within the last month or so.
In mid-December I had my interview with the World Race. During my interview, I was asked if I was in a relationship, as I’m sure they ask every applicant. Of course my response was no, and they asked me if I would be willing to not enter into a relationship or not pursue any relationships from the time I get accepted for the race until it is finished. I said, yeah definitely! I mean it’s been a year and a half since I have been in a relationship anyway, what’s another year and a half?! Well during this time I was talking to a young lady quite often and wasn’t exactly sure where our friendship was going to take us but we continued to talk just about everyday. While I was waiting to hear back from the World Race on my acceptance, I began reading a book called “The Right Guy For The Right Girl” which I’m sure you guessed is about becoming the right guy for your future wife. After reading the very first chapter about reckless abandonment for God, I felt quite a knot in my stomach that I like to call the ‘Holy Spirit knot’. Which is basically whenever I feel like God is trying to tell me to do something that many times I don’t necessarily like/want to do. But I wasn’t entirely sure what exactly He wanted me to do. So I pulled out my iPad and began typing what I felt like the Spirit was leading me to do. Needless to say, what came next was not exactly an exciting challenge for my ‘flesh’. As I typed out what I felt God was telling me, I felt like He was challenging me to not text any girls more than 5 times in a conversation and to not pursue any kind of romantic relationship over the next year and a half (whether I got accepted for the race or not) and spend my time of singleness focused on Him! WOW! Now for me, that was a challenge alright! Just the simple fact of having someone to talk to throughout the day was a nice thing to have but I knew that this was a time where I had to act in reckless obedience whether I liked it or not because eventually it was going to happen! So the next day I called that young lady and explained what I felt God was telling me and what had to happen.
Trust me, this was a challenge like no other! But I know for sure that my obedience will be rewarded and I have already seen my prayer life and my trust in God improving!
This morning as I was in the Word I noticed quite a comical picture of obedience to the things that God is telling us to do. I’ve been looking at the lives of Elijah and Elisha in 1&2 Kings, two huge faith giants in the Old Testament and this is what I came across this morning:
“Meanwhile, the Lord instructed one of the group of prophets to say to another man, “Hit me!” But the man refused to hit the prophet. Then the prophet told him, “Because you have not obeyed the voice of the Lord, a lion will kill you as soon as you leave me.” And when he had gone, a lion did attack and kill him.”
-1 Kings 20:35-36
So in short, if you don’t want to get attacked by a lion, just obey God! It’s going to happen sooner or later!
