Tuesday, February 18th, 2025
God has been speaking to me lately about obedience. For many of us, when we hear that word obedience we get a little twinge inside that says, “Oh no, what is He going to ask me to do?” It’s like we decide that whatever it is it will surely be outside of our ability, our capacity and our comfort zone. Like a few other things in our life, we tend to complicate what is meant to be a simple thing.
Let’s look at Moses for example. When God spoke to him from the burning bush He didn’t say, “I want you (Moses) to deliver my people from Egypt. Ok, on your mark, get set, go!” No, God said, “I have seen the oppression of my people…I have come down to deliver them…I will send you to Pharaoh.” (Exodus 3:7-10). God was going to do the work; He just needed a willing vessel. Moses responded like many of us and questioned who he was and the skills that he was sure he didn’t have.
Eventually Moses surrendered himself to the task. He didn’t develop a 40-year blueprint or map out the best path there. He just followed God one step at a time, “Ok God, the bloody water wasn’t enough for Pharaoh, what’s next?”, “Ok God, we are trapped between this sea and our enemies, what’s next?”, “Ok God, the people are hungry, how can you help us?”
Sometimes when God asks us to do something simple, like to pray with someone, our Complicator 2000 fires up and starts imaging various things. What will happen if they say no, what if we don’t know what to say, or what if our prayers don’t work? God didn’t ask us to solve this person’s problems or be the answer they need. What if we never find out the impact of our prayers? What if we never get a tear rolling down their face or even a thank you? Would it mean that our step of obedience wasn’t successful? You see, we measure success by what we see and how it makes us feel. God measures success by one step of obedience at a time. He can make the impossible successful, He just wants us to say yes.
Final Thoughts…
God says, if you just plant the seed, I will run the code to make the plant grow. If you will just water the plant, I will tell it how to grow leaves. If you will just give it a few words of sunshine, I will make it grow fruit. If you will just give it a little shade from the scorching heat I will help it to rest and build up its strength to get growing again. You didn’t create this world or anything in it, I did. Let me keep it running as I have since the beginning of time. All I need from you is simple obedience, one yes at a time.