Obedience is a thing that many Christians don’t know or understand. It is the air you breathe because if it wasn’t for the obedience of Jesus Christ where would we be right now?
Without being obedient to God you can forget about learning and living to be all that God has made you to be. For it is IMPOSSIBLE to please God without being obedient and having Faith in Him!
“If you love me, obey my commandments.” (John 14:15 NLT)
It is the little tasks of being obedient which gives rise to a significant harvest. It is stuff like putting your shopping cart back in the designated section for shopping carts at the store or cleaning your room on the regular and not just tossing clothes on a chair and leaving it there until the avalanche of clothes eventually falls off the chair.
It’s usually in the little that God tests you, challenges you and more importantly grows your Spiritual gift of patience. The bible says that those who are faithful in the little will be given much more. Simply put, look after the little God has given you and He will bless you with more when the time is right.
“If you are faithful in little things, you will be faithful in large ones. But if you are dishonest in little things, you won’t be honest with greater responsibilities.” (Luke 16:10 NLT)
So in the same way, God uses the little tests of obedience to grow you and enable you to develop coping mechanisms to help you to deal with whatever comes your way. So, think about what God has been asking you to do and if you haven’t done it yet, JUST DO IT!
It is usually the things that we refuse to do or take our own time with that could be blocking our obedience harvest (the harvest that comes from being obedient).
For example, you could be asking God for more money but you’re not tithing or you’re being stingy by not sharing with others. One should remember that at the end of the day, that which was given to you is from God. There is a greater purpose to tithing on the regular or sharing your lunch with a friend. Sometimes it’s so that God can provide for another through you and that person will see God’s love through you!
The thing about obedience is it’s NOT just about YOU it’s about something bigger than you or your immediate family. Let’s look at what happens when you choose to be obedient to God. This choice alone and the action that stems from your choice; whether it be just to pray or to physically do something creates a shift in the Spiritual realm and in you. This shift usually precedes change in the natural (physical) realm. You see, everything God asks of you to do, genuinely does count!
For example, the one day I walked into a convenience store at a gas station and God had asked me to buy a bottle of Lipton peach iced tea. And I thought, “Oh, yes my Father is spoiling me.” After, I was told to put the iced tea into the refrigerator as soon as I got to work, and being me, I did as God had asked of me. Mid-day came and still there was no, “Let’s have some iced tea”. I eventually forgot about the iced tea. And just before I left work, I had the privilege of blessing a lady at work with the iced tea.
If I wasn’t obedient I wouldn’t have seen the joy of being a blessing to another and more importantly I would have restricted God in cultivating a generous heart in me. In summary, obedience is life; it is the air we breathe and we need it more than we know or care to understand. God knows exactly what His doing and He won’t fail us or forsake us, so give Him a chance and make the choice to develop a habit of obedience in you!