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"If you love me, you will obey what I command." John 14:15
In the middle of all the hustle and bustle of the Christmas season, let's pause and think back to the first Christmas. Have you ever stopped to put yourself in Joseph's shoes? Here was a guy who found out his fiancé was pregnant, claiming she was visited by an angel and it's God's baby. And she wanted him to believe her! In an instant Joseph's whole world was turned upside down. This was not the way his life was supposed to turn out. It just didn't make any sense. Do you know the feeling? Maybe you finances suddenly take a turn for the worse, or layoffs are looming at work, or you've just received news of a health crisis in your family. How are you going to handle it? What do you do when things in your life don't make sense? Joseph made the choice to do what God said to do and it changed everything. Joseph chose to obey God even though he didn't understand what was happening. Today, the word obey has a negative connotation. We view obedience as a forced, unwilling decision to do something we don't want to do because we're afraid of punishment. But that's not the kind of obedience that's in God's Word. Obedience in the Bible means this: love + trust + action. It starts with love, as Jesus said in John 14:15, "If you love me, you will obey what I command." Obedience comes from knowing that God loves you and you love him in return. A lot of people think obedience is about fearing God, but God wants us to see obedience to him as a relationship of love. And out of love comes trust. If you trust what God is saying to you, and you believe that he loves you, then that will lead to action. You need to have all three because action without love is just rote religion. And love without action is just mere talk. Joseph was able to accept what Mary and the angel told him because of his relationship with God. He knew God loved him and he loved God. He trusted God and made the choice to do what God asked him to do. And because of that, Joseph's life is still impacting lives today.
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I will hasten and not delay to obey your commands. Psalm 119:60
This week, as we think about obedience and how to live it out, I want to look at five actions Joseph took in the first Christmas that showed his obedience to God. When the angel appeared to Joseph in a dream, he told Joseph, "Do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit" (Matthew 1:20). So that's what Joseph did. "When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife" (Matthew 1:24). He didn't hesitate, he just did it. There is a refreshing immediacy to Joseph's relationship with God. When God said it, Joseph did it. If you believe God loves you, and you want to live a life of obedience in response to his love, then this how you should respond. Living in immediate obedience to God is a kind of life that breathes with excitement and joy. I've had the opportunity to meet a lot of great men and women of faith from around the world. They are all different from each other, but there one thing they all have in common. When they sense God saying to do something, they don't hesitate. They step out and do it. First John 5:3 says, "This is love for God, to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome." So if something God asks you to do feels like a burden, what's wrong? Usually it's procrastination. When we don't act right away, it becomes harder to do the longer we wait. But when we do what God says, the most refreshing freedom will come into our lives. What is God calling you to do? Is it a phone call you need to make? An action you need to take? Whatever it is, write it down right now, tell God you're willing to do it, and ask him to give you the strength you need to make it happen.
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But Joseph had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus. Matthew 1:25
Some people are good at the immediate. They can jump right into anything, but they are not good at 'keeping on keeping on.' And other people are good at lasting, but it takes them a long time to get there. To live the exciting life of faith that God has planned for you, you need to be good at both the immediate and the lasting. And both of those require that you keep on trusting. Joseph didn't understand what it meant for Jesus to have a virgin birth; he didn't understand Jesus would be God in human flesh. But he knew what God told him to do and so Joseph kept on trusting. He was a newlywed who didn't get a honeymoon, and his new marriage was not anything like he planned, but he still kept trusting. What are you going to do when life doesn't work out like you planned or wanted? I am always encouraged by what the apostle Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4:8, "We are pressed on every side by troubles, but not crushed and broken. We are perplexed because we don't know why things happen as they do, but we don't give up and quit." I don't know why some people are diagnosed with terminal cancer. I don't know why some children rebel so strongly against their parents. I don't know why so many things happen that don't make sense. So it's encouraging to hear one of the greatest men of faith say, "I don't know why thing happen as they do, but I still choose to not give up." It's good to know that we can trust God and that he knows things we don't. He has promised that one day he will set everything right. one day he will bring everyone who trusts in him together. Until then there are two ways you can live your life. You can live feeling like God owes you an explanation or you can live realizing God has given you great gifts. If you live life feeling like God owes you an explanation, you will only wind up in a constant state of bitterness because God doesn't owe you anything. But even though he doesn't owe you anything, he has given you everything. He gave you his own Son. He gave you the gift of eternal life. He gave you the promise of being together with him forever. Those are great gifts.
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When the wise men had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. "Get up," he said, "take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him." So he got up, took the child and his other during the night and left for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod. Matthew 2:13-15
Joseph and Mary had to let a lot of things go because of their faith journey. They left everything they knew when they headed to Egypt. And in one sense, what they were sacrificing was their comfort at the deepest level. It is often uncomfortable to trust God and follow his plan because we get comfortable with the wrong things. We get comfortable with our little habits and rituals, the things that get us stuck where we are instead of getting us to where God wants to grow us. If you commit your health to God it will probably mean giving up some of your favorite foods. If you commit your finances to God it will probably mean cutting back on your spending. It's uncomfortable to break a habit. It's uncomfortable to face a fear. It's uncomfortable to go somewhere you've never been before or forgive someone who has hurt you. But growth and change always come through doing those uncomfortable things and that's what's good in it. But if we don't we would continue to hold on to something that makes us feel comfortable and end up turning our back on God who is the source of comfort. The Bible says, "Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the Father of compassion and God of all comfort" (2 Corinthians 1:3). I invite you this Christmas, like never before, to recognize that God is the God of all comfort. And in those moments when you want to turn back to that old habit, that old way of thinking which pulls you off track, turn to God and say, "God, give me your comfort."
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After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child's life are dead." Matthew 2:19-20
As uncomfortable as it was for Joseph to move his family to Egypt, imagine how scary it would be for him to obey God's command to come back to Israel. It was like going back into the jaws of the lion. He was going to take Mary and Jesus back to where his son's life had been in danger. But because Joseph trusted God and what he was saying, Joseph took the risk and went there because he knew that was the right place to be. The Bible says, "Even when I am afraid, I keep trusting you" (Psalm 56:3). Notice this verse says, "when I am afraid" not "if I am afraid." We may want a life of no fears in this world but that only happens in heaven. In this life, we're all going to face fears of one kind or another. We have some big fears and some little fears. We fear the future, we fear what's going to happen with our jobs, what's going to happen with our family; and we fear little things like whether we said the right thing to someone, whether that presentation went well, even fear of making a phone call. In all of these situations, you have a choice to make. Are you going to let the fear control you or are you going to take a risk of faith because you know you have a God who loves you? That risk of faith could mean going someplace you've never been before or forgiving someone you thought you couldn't forgive. It could mean leaving your job. A risk of faith could also be praying about something or deciding to trust God with a situation or a relationship you've held tight in your hand. What Christ-like risk is God telling you to take in faith?
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When Joseph heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. Matthew 2:21-23
A lot of people think living an obedient life of faith means putting your mind in neutral and letting God direct you wherever he wants as if you are a robot. That's not it at all. The Bible says, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind" (Luke 10:27). You've got to engage your brain with God and live out the kind of life he has for you to live. This is what Joseph did when he obeyed God's command to move back to Israel. Joseph heard that Herod's son was reigning in Judea so he was afraid to go there. "Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth" (Matthew 2:23). Nazareth is where the Bible prophesied that Jesus was going to live, so Joseph was exactly in the center of God's will. And he got there by looking at the situation - the politics, Herod's son as ruler - and he realized it wasn't a safe place to be, and engaged his mind with God to make the right decision. So where should we get God's command for our lives? We may not have angels showing up to guide us but we do have hundreds and hundreds of pages of God's Word. To live a life of obedience we need to get to know what God has said to us. Jesus talked about this in Matthew 7:24, "So then, anyone who hears these words of mine and obeys them is like a wise man who built his house on rock." We have God's Word to help us live out a relationship with him. It's not a dry book of directions. It is God's love letter to us, a Father's letter of instruction to show us how to live the kind of life he wants to give us. As you read God's Word, I encourage you to pray Psalm 119:34, "Give me insight so I can do what you tell me - my whole life one long, obedient response." |
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"Just tell me what to do and I will do it, Lord. As long as I live I'll wholeheartedly obey." Psalm 119:33
God smiles when we obey him wholeheartedly. That means doing whatever God asks without reservation or hesitation. You don't procrastinate and say, "I'll pray about it." You do it without delay. Every parent knows that delayed obedience is really disobedience. God doesn't owe you an explanation or reason for everything he asks you to do. Understanding can wait, but obedience can't. Instant obedience will teach you more about God than a lifetime of Bible discussions. In fact, you will never understand some commands until you obey them first. Obedience unlocks understanding. Wholehearted obedience is done joyfully, with enthusiasm. The Bible says, "Obey him gladly." (Psalm 100:2) This is the attitude of David: "Just tell me what to do and I will do it, Lord. As long as I live I'll wholeheartedly obey." (Psalm 119:33) James, speaking to Christians, said, "We please God by what we do and not only by what we believe." (James 2:24) God's Word is clear that you can't earn your salvation. It comes only by grace, not your effort. But as a child of God you can bring pleasure to your heavenly Father through obedience. Any act of obedience is also an act of worship. Why is obedience so pleasing to God? Because it proves you really love him. Jesus said, "If you love me, you will obey my commandments." (John 14:15)
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"Come!" answered Jesus. So Peter got out of the boat and started walking on the water to Jesus. Matthew 14:29
Remember when Jesus called Peter to step out of the boat and walk to him across the water. It was a call to voluntarily give up the security of the boat for the insecurity of walking on rough water (Matthew 14:22-31). With single-minded obedience, Peter takes the first step and, when his foot doesn't sink into the water, his faith is affirmed. God uses our obedience to put us in a position where we can develop faith. Jesus calls us to take the first step and then, only after we've taken that step, he will reveal the next step. In this sense, you cannot develop faith if you are disobedient to Jesus. You may give intellectual assent to what God can do but unless you take the first step, you do not have faith. Yet, this is where so many of us get stuck. We hesitate; we step back from obedience in order to speculate what we should do next -- even though Jesus has already told us what we must do. There is no other path than obedience to developing faith. Only by leaving the "security" of the boat does Peter discover that the greater security is in Jesus. In truth, the only security is in Jesus. Peter learns firsthand - or perhaps firstfoot! - that Jesus is Lord over all circumstances. Peter also learns that what we see and think, apart from Jesus, is not a reflection of reality. The mythology we live by is that the greatest safety is in the boat; the reality is safest place to be is with Jesus.
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