Obey God No Matter What

Obeying God no matter what is one of the principles that I would love to be the basis for my life and am seeking to model & teach to my boys.

As I seek to "obey God no matter what", I've discovered that obedience is not limited to what we don't do (the thou shalt not's), nor is obeying God is not always black & white or as simple as the 10 Commandments and the Golden Rule.  There are perhaps four types of obedience we must be aware of to actually "obey God no matter what" --

OBVIOUS OBEDIENCE: this probably gets the bulk of our attention & most of us know if we are obeying or disobeying God in this category because it is obvious.  Either we feel good about ourselves ("I don't drink or smoke or chew, or hang with guys who do!") or we feel guilty because we don't measure up.  Obvious obedience includes things like the Ten Commandments and treating people right.

OPPORTUNISTIC OBEDIENCE ... this is when a door opens and we have an opportunity to live for God that we did not have before.  Things like inviting a friend to church, praying for someone in need, being generous (more than the tithe, the tithe is obvious) with extra money, and taking the initiative to do the right thing (see James 4:17).  This type of obedience requires being alert, being prepared, and being bold.

We must look for God to open doors (see Colossians 4:2-4), be ready to go through them (i.e. When God opens the door for a single to begin dating, is their character ready? When God opens the door for you to share Jesus with someone, do you have the knowledge to explain why your hope is in Christ?), and we must have courage because opportunistic obedience requires us to seize the moment for God.

LIGHT YOU HAVE OBEDIENCE-- Often times we will never have all the facts, all the information, or the level of certainty we would like.  But God always gives us enough light to take the next step of obedience.  Sometimes God works like a flashlight does on a dark trail.  We have enough light to take two, maybe three steps but as we take those steps the light moves ahead of us and so we keep moving.  This means we don't need to worry about all the things we don't know, just respond to the light we have.  This keeps us moving and keeps us from regret.  The underlying principle here is that the amount of light we have at any given moment is not nearly as important as what we are doing with that light.  (Psalm 89:15)

ENDURING OBEDIENCE is being consistent in your walk.  We can't be hot and then cold.  We can't seize opportunities and walk in the light today and tomorrow be afraid to obey and drawn to darkness. We can't love our neighbor (obvious obedience) on Monday and curse him on Tuesday (obvious disobedience).  Enduring obedience is obeying God in "all of the above" categories which ultimately leads us closer and closer to God, God's best, and God's blessings.