What does God want from us?

When we place Abraham, David and Joseph’s obedience under the mantle of God’s necessary intervention in human history their willing involvement changes everything. Requests to change a life’s trajectory, or leave a home nation, or marry a pregnant girl appear to have little consequence. Yet, these divine collaborations set up a future of immeasurable significance. God asked these men to do something within their arena of possibility. In order to secure their participation he offered them the world. 

The effort of most requests by God probably trace a similar set of circumstances for us. Divine submission likely will result in strenuous and life altering commitments. That’s probably why we hesitate. We see the potential difficulties ahead. Will being open to hearing from God mean such things will be asked of us? Do we allow ourselves to hear the incredible reasons behind God wanting us to join him?

We may assume that we’ll not be asked to form a new nation of holy people, subdue rueful armies like the Philistines, Moab, and Arameans, or foster the Mother of God in order to share the parenting of the redeemer of mankind. Billions of God fearers, Spirit led folks, and Christ followers can’t expect to have such enormous impacts upon the future of the world.

And yet ...

Obedience: how God involves us


http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/031918.cfm
2 SM 7:4-5A, 12-14A, 16
ROM 4:13, 16-18, 22
MT 1:16, 18-21, 24A


Most of the commentary about obedience in scripture asks us to consider the incredible outcomes that can result by simply obeying God. The reason we should keep our eyes upon holiness through obedience is the exhilarating idea that we’re participating in a divine plan. We should consider that what we think are tiny, likely unimportant lives are actually crucial bolts in the span of a bridge between our lives and heaven. Our willing connection to God’s divine plan will assist the progress for every subsequent generation of human beings. 

In fact, what we might think are minor strays off the path — our disobedience is OK because holiness is too demanding anyway — may well be the dismissal of a crucial divine request. Disobedience not only avoids aligning ourselves to God, but may ultimately conflict with the very purpose for creation. 

The subject for obedience in the above list of scriptures urges us to realize that disobedience will affect our children, our families, and our spouses. Being obedient to God does not just improve our own welfare.

Our three examples of obedient holiness in Samuel, Romans and Matthew offer some of the most amazing consequences from some very normal acts of obedience ever recorded in human history. The outcomes from three men’s willing submissions to God radiate like raging fires. The sparks of obedience themselves begin rather small. 

We hear in Samuel that King David, at God’s request, is told to refrain from building a temple, a house for the Lord. The year was 1,000 years before Christ. David envisioned constructing a holy, permanent temple, rather than the small primitive looking ark. He imagined a House for God to live in, among the tribe of Judah. God said no. He had a more grand idea, to establish a permanent Kingdom and throne which would fall to David’s son, Solomon, and ultimately the Son of God himself. The prophet Nathan tells David that God has different plans for him, more than just an architect of a temple. David is supposed to grow the land and holdings of the people of God, absorbing one nation after another. David’s son would have the task of establishing the Kingdom of Israel in Jerusalem for all the world to see, for all time.

David’s impetus to obey? “Your house and your kingdom are firm forever before me; your throne shall be firmly established forever.” 

Remember the beginnings of the obedient act, though. Refrain from heading off on a grand vision. Every human ever born has had at least one wild-eyed idea to please God. That’s not so uncommon. David was a great King. He had grand ideas every single day. God’s request had other things in mind than David’s grand life. "Do this one thing for me," he told David. David set aside his ego, and complied. 

In the second reading, in Romans, the author writes that Abraham also was asked to perform a personally challenging, but humbling act of obedience. Abraham lived during the Bronze age, 2,000 years before Christ. Long before David, and long before the establishment of Kings in the lineage of the Jews from the tribe of Judah. Abraham lived in the earliest days before a Hebrew people existed. God asked Abraham to leave his home, the land of Ur. Like David, God’s request came with a promise. Abraham would be the source of descendants that would populate the world with a holy people.  

(Abraham) is our father in the sight of God,
in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead
and calls into being what does not exist.
He believed, hoping against hope,
that he would become the father of many nations,
according to what was said, Thus shall your descendants be.

The obedient act that Abraham must do? Pack up and move to another place. In our current cultures we’re presented with that request on an almost annual basis. Abraham had many challenging requests later by God that were much more severe in their nature than this. To offer his son Isaac as a sacrifice is just one of them. Moving his family was the beginning of an amazing journey.

And in the third request for obedience by a willing partner to God, we hear about Joseph who is asked to take on for what him could be a most humbling burden. He must not divorce his betrothed, a girl already legally his wife. She is pregnant at 14 year old, but not by Joseph. Those who knew him and who would learn of his dilemma later would wonder at his decision. Why must Joseph do this?

For it is through the Holy Spirit
that this child has been conceived in her.
She will bear a son and you are to name him Jesus,
because he will save his people from their sins.

The moral dilemma presented to Joseph challenges him with an anti-cultural choice that our 21st Century culture deals with rather regularly. Men and women marrying into the care and parenting of children from someone other than their spouse shocks no one. 

Again, though, Joseph’s subsequent life, like Abraham and David, has cosmic consequences. Obedience, shrouded in difficulty, overcome only with courage and humility, invites us to join God in adventures whose purposes we likely cannot fathom. 

These are three stories, with substantial historical records to support them by the way, that highlight the specific burdens of obedience. Even though odd requests at first, they matter to God. They even have a familiarity for our modern existence — set aside a grand plan we have the resources to accomplish, pack up and move from a place where we are well known and prosperous, and marry a spouse whose child is not ours. When looked at from the position of our day and all of the weird things that happen, these acts are not that considerable. The burden of obedience involved here is quite doable for these men. And for us.

When we place Abraham, David and Joseph’s obedience under the mantle of God’s necessary intervention in human history their willing involvement changes everything. Requests to change a life’s trajectory, or leave a home nation, or marry a pregnant girl appear to have little consequence. Yet, these divine collaborations set up a future of immeasurable significance. God asked these men to do something within their arena of possibility. In order to secure their participation he offered them the world. 

The effort of most requests by God probably trace a similar set of circumstances for us. Divine submission likely will result in strenuous and life altering commitments. That’s probably why we hesitate. We see the potential difficulties ahead. Will being open to hearing from God mean such things will be asked of us? Do we allow ourselves to hear the incredible reasons behind God wanting us to join him?

We may assume that we’ll not asked to form a new nation of holy people, subdue rueful armies like the Philistines, Moab, and Arameans, or foster the Mother of God in order to share the parenting of the redeemer of mankind. Billions of God fearers, Spirit led folks, and Christ followers can’t expect to have such enormous impacts upon the future of the world.

And yet ... we may be asked to foster holiness in places which God can use for incredible purposes. We may be called to sacrifice our lives to protect the innocent and establish peace. We are almost all faced with nurturing our family. Could it be that our own home of gathered believers will witness to the world? 

I propose that the enormous impacts of our obedience to God, personal acts of faith, may well be historic. To assume that the glorious efforts and subsequent reputations of Abraham, David and Joseph surpasses our understanding, and therefore relegates our lives to non-essential and mundane existences, is probably a great mistake.

Have we heard a request by God, an act of obedience that will change the course of our lives? Does the request, a prompting, an urging from a place we feel certain flows from the Holy Spirit, seem easy to ignore because it’s just a bit too difficult to deal with right now? Or, is it knowing that God would ask us for hard things that we make sure we’re not open to hearing his voice? The idea that God would think to rely upon us may be the very reason we’re not willing to be available. 

Obedience to God is a burden because the physical act “to obey” bends our will. 

Agreeing to hear God’s plan for us would make us his partner, though. As this reflection started, consider the reason we should keep our eyes upon holiness through obedience. Focus upon the exhilarating idea that we’re participating in a divine plan. Envision the thought that what we think are tiny, likely unimportant lives are actually crucial bolts in the span of a bridge between our lives and heaven. In fact, consider it to be true in every way that the willing connection to God’s divine plan will assist the progress for every subsequent generation of human beings. 

According to innumerable scripture accounts, our obedience, our willing collaboration, is exactly how God accomplishes great things. 

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