O is for Obey...

My  mom let me share on her blog last week... check it out!  www.laurareimer.net  

Obedience...the cost. 

“O is for obey, O is for obey, everyday in everyway O is for obey.” 

It’s a song that’s sung over and over in our house (to “Farmer in the Dell” if you are curious) trying to teach our three year old to obey. It started at kids’ church and well, my husband and I picked up on it to use at home too.  It’s no coincidence that my favorite verse (as a parent) happens to be this month’s preschool memory verse and is written on the chalkboard in our kitchen...Ephesians 6:1 - children, obey your parents in the Lord for this is right. 

We ask our son to do all sorts of things and we expect first-time obedience (I can just hear the well-seasoned parental veterans chuckling at this point including my own mom and dad!). No, it doesn’t always happen, but we do our best to hold him accountable for his actions. You see, our point is if he is obedient with the little things, he will be obedient with the big things. We want him to obey the first time we tell him to pick up his animals, so when we tell him to stop at the curb of an intersection, he stops the first time when it truly is life and death. Most of the time, we get Socrates-style questions from him on whether or not he should obey or if he can go clean something else first or at times, he fails to follow the instruction and continues doing what he was doing. The problem with all of these options are - they are disobedience. Doing something else good doesn’t knock off the work you have been assigned. And from my mom’s previous postings, we all know how well our son’s disobedience turns out

Well...makes me think of Jonah and his disobedience. And we all know how whale that turned out for him... 

My husband and I are in a season of first-time obedience. We had a calling placed on our hearts and our lives that we are living out right now. We are walking through the fire of obedience. And we are listening...and it is costing us. But we know that walking the path of first-time obedience leads straight to the Savior’s arms, His feet, and the beat of His heart. We are living in the pain caused by another’s disobedience and deceitfulness and it hurts. 

John 14:15 says “If you love me, you will obey what I command”. And we do...we love Jesus and want to follow Him because we know in Luke 11:28, He replies, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it.”

It may seem silly to the world, to obey God knowing the cost...but that Savior whose arms I mentioned? His hands hold the scars of His obedience. Those feet? Scarred by His obedience. Nail holes, put there by my sins. 

But oh, His heart...the heart that bled for me and the one that loves me. 

He promises over and over to strengthen my heart (Psalm 73:26), create a clean heart (Psalm 51:10), hold fast my heart (Proverbs 23:26), guard my heart (Proverbs 4:23)...

So, as we continue to walk together in obedience, we will focus on Jesus letting the garbage of the world dim in comparison to His light. 

For the cost of obedience is high by earthly terms, but the cost of disobedience is so much greater and the reward of obedience is something indescribable...

So we continue to sing, “O is for obey...”