The cost of obedience

 

Today’s devotional is about praise to God for those who instruct others in the Word of God and who set a good example. I’m thankful for my mentors. My mother and grandmother were believers, yet this task fell to an older woman in the local church who gave me study assignments and helped me understand the basics. After we moved from there, God sent many more mentors. Looking back, I realize my biggest problem was not gleaning crucial information but putting it into practice.

Paul knew this could happen. He wrote two reminders to Timothy:

I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well. (2 Timothy 1:5)

But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. (2 Timothy 3:14–15)

This young man had a sincere faith yet was timid and perhaps uncertain at times. Paul encouraged him to not only believe but do what he learned. Some of his instructions:

Therefore, do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began. (2 Timothy 1:8–9)

Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you. (2 Timothy 1:13–14)

You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. (2 Timothy 2:1–3)

Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth. But avoid irreverent babble, for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness. (2 Timothy 2:15–16)

Flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. Have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies; you know that they breed quarrels. And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil. (2 Timothy 2:22–24)

Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it. (2 Timothy 3:12–14)

Perhaps my problem with application is not a lack of personal mentors but that old bugaboo of thinking that because I knew the truths, knowing them was sufficient. That was sometimes intimidating to those who otherwise could have challenged my lack of obedience.

Yet God is faithful. In these past few years, we are in a local church that has many godly people setting fantastic examples of doing God’s will. I praise God for those who instruct and encourage righteousness, who teach others about Christ and how to live for Him. I’m also thankful that God can use anyone to be a mentor. One of my favorites was a young woman with several children who expressed the love of God in remarkable ways. Another is a young pastor who freely shares his struggle to obey what he knows and how God guides him in creative obedience.

PRAY: Jesus, today’s reading takes me to Hannah who was barren and prayed for a son, vowing to give him to You — and she did have a son and did give him to the current priest to be trained to serve. She then praised You for Your great power and wisdom, setting an example of what it means to let go of what is precious that others might grow in the grace and knowledge of You. (1 Samuel 1:1–2:10)

PONDER: Think about what obedience challenges me to give up. Broadly, it could be time, money, reputation, all sorts of things that would bring glory to Jesus and certainly not to me. Hannah gave up the child that she dearly longed for after God gave him to her. How does her example apply to my life?

 

 

Selected for His team . . .

 

In (Christ) we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. Ephesians 1:11)

Dozens of positions are obtained by an election with people choosing, from leadership of a country to who pitches for a scrub baseball game. Even winning a ‘viewer’s choice’ is an election of sorts, but all of them involve currying some sort of favor with the people who vote — except this one: God took the initiative in salvation by choosing me and granting me saving faith.

This one election was not about picking a favorite based on merit but all about the mystery of God’s grace in determining that I and thousands of others should belong to Him, should be His children and heirs to all He has. This blessing is so great that Paul wrote this tumble of words that barely begin to describe it . . .

 . . . He chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. (Ephesians 1:4–6)

I rarely put quilts in quilt shows, but a few times have won ‘viewer’s choice’ ribbons. The public did the picking because they liked it and I felt honored. However, in this amazing election by God, He does the picking so He will be honored. I am a mere sinner, fallen short of His glory and without merit. No one gives me a ribbon for this and if they did, it would be lousy theology. God gets the praise, all of it.

There are people who think believers chose God, probably looking at only one aspect of what happens in salvation. The deeper question is: Who initiated the process? Did God choose me on the basis of my faith in Him, or did He, by choosing me, enable me to respond in faith?

I might be among those who insist that I choose to follow Christ except for a few passages of Scripture that describe how impossible this is:

As it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God.” (Romans 3:10–11)

The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. (1 Corinthians 2:14)

Other passages say that unbelievers are spiritually dead, blind, and ignorant of the life of God. Those in that condition are the people Jesus referred to in John 6:44, “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him . . . .”

About fifty years ago, the Holy Spirit revealed to me that Jesus is God in human flesh, that I am a sinner who needed forgiveness, and that God is good. Through the years, it became clear that this was His “holy calling, not according to my works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was granted me in Christ Jesus from all eternity.” (2 Timothy 1:8–9) God took the initiative — I was running the other way, oblivious to His grace.

Now it is clear that even though the choice to obey Him is involved, before He saved me my only choice was my only choice — I would never seek God unless He kept at me to melt my hard heart and bless me with faith.

Sitting here with the sun shining through the window, I still feel the emotion of that day when Jesus opened my mind and heart to the reality of who He is and why He came. A far greater light shone in then, and all because God decided to elect me into His family. It is still a mystery, even though I now realize why I need Him and need to be here. Praise God for His gift of saving faith and His ability to change lives from sinful selfishness to loving Him and desiring holiness.

READ MORE: Ezekiel 36:22–32, Ephesians 2:1, 2 Corinthians 4:4, Ephesians 4:18, John 15:16,