Obedience

In opposition to sin stands obedience. ‘‘For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.... Ye became the servants of righteousness’’ (Rom. 5: 19; 6: 18). In connection with all that has been said about sin, and the new life, and the reception of the Holy Spirit, we must always give to obedience the place assigned to it by God.

It was because Christ humbled Himself and became obedient unto death, yea, the death of the Cross, that God so highly exalted Him. And Paul, in this connection, exhorts us: ‘‘Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus’’ (Phil. 2: 5). We see, above everything else, that the obedience of Christ, which was so pleasing to God, must become really the characteristic of our disposition and of our entire walk. Just as a servant knows that he must first obey his master in all things, so the surrender to an implicit and unquestioning obedience must become the essential characteristic of our lives.

How little this is understood by Christians! How many there are who allow themselves to be misled, and rest satisfied with the thought that sin is a necessity, that one must sin every day! It would be difficult to say how great the harm is which has been done by this mistake. It is one of the chief causes why the sin of disobedience is go little recognized. I have myself heard Christians, speaking about the cause of darkness and weakness, say, half-laughingly: ‘‘Yes, it is just disobedience again.’’ We try to get rid of a servant as speedily as possible who is habitually disobedient, but it is not regarded as anything extraordinary that a child of God should be disobedient every day. Disobedience is daily acknowledged, and yet there is no turning away from it.

Have we not here the reason why so much prayer for the power of the Holy Spirit is offered, and yet

so few answers come? Do we not read nee ‘*God.

has given His Holy Spirit to them that obey Him’’? Hivery child of God has received the Holy Spirit. If he uses the measure of the Holy Spirit which he has, with the definite purpose of being obedient to the utmost, then God can and will favour him with further manifestations of the Spirit’s power. But if he permits disobedience to get the upper hand, day by day, he need not wonder if his prayer for more of the Spirit remains unanswered.

We have already said that we must not forget that the Spirit desires to possess more of us. How can we wholly surrender ourselves to Him otherwise than by being obedient? The Scripture says that we must be led by the Spirit, that we must walk by the Spirit. My right relationship to the Holy Spirit is that I allow myself to be guided and ruled by Him. Obedience is the great factor in our whole relationship to God. ‘‘Obey My voice, and I will be your God.’’

Mark how the Lord Jesus, on the last night, when giving His great promise about the Holy Spirit, lays emphasis on this point. ‘‘If ye love me, keep My commandments. And I will pray the Father, and

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He shall give you another Comforter’’ (John 14: 15, 16). Obedience was essential as a preparation for the reception of the Spirit. And this thought is often repeated by Him. ‘‘He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me: and he that loveth Me shall be loved of My Father, and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him’’ (John 14: 21). So also in v. 23: ‘If a - man love Me, he will keep My Words: and My Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.’’ ‘‘If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you’’ (15: 7). ‘‘If ye keep My commandments, ye shall abide in My love’’ (v.10). ‘‘Ye are My friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you’”’ (v. 14).

Can words more plainly or impressively declare that the whole life, in the new dispensation, following the resurrection of Christ, depends on obedience? That is the Spirit of Christ. He lived to do not His own will, but the will of the Father. And He cannot with His Spirit make an abiding home in the heart of one who does not surrender himself utterly to a life of obedience.

Alas, how few there are who are truly cael because of this disobedience! How little it is believed that Christ really asks for, and expects this from us — because He has undertaken to make it possible for us. How much is it manifested in prayer, or walk, or in the depths of the soul-life, that we really endeavour to be well-pleasing to the Lord in all things? We say too little in regard to our disobedience. ‘‘I will be sorry for my sin.”’

But is obedience really possible? It is certain for the man who believes that Christ Jesus is his sanctification, and relies on Him.

Just as it is impossible for a man whose eyes have not yet been opened, to see that Christ can at once forgive his sin, so is it also with faith in the assurance that there is in Christ a sure promise of power to accomplish all that God desires from His child. Just.as,. through faith, we found the fullness 3 of forgiveness; so through a new act. of faith,

ie has SO. so easily beset. us is. obtained, ‘and the

abiding blessing of the continuous experience of the

keeping power of Christ becomesours. This faith obtains a new insight into promises the meaning of which was not previously .nderstood: ‘‘The God. of peace. .. make you perfect in every good work to do His will, working in you that which ig well-pleasing in Hig sight, through Jesus Christ’’ (Heb. 13: 20, 21). ‘‘Unto Him that is able to keep you from falling... be glory and majesty’’ (Jude 24, 25). ‘*Give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall’? (2 Peter 1: 10). ‘‘To the end He may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness’’ (1 Thess. 3:13). ‘‘But the Lord is faithful, who shall stablish you, and keep you from evil’’ (2 Thess. Bua

When the soul understands that the fulfilment of these and other promises is secured for us in Christ, and that, as certainly as the forgiveness of sin is assured to us in Him, so also is power against new or fresh attacks of sin assured to us. Then for the first time is the lesson learned aright that faith can confidently rely upon a full Christ, and His abiding protection.

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This faith sheds a wholly new light on the life of obedience. Christ holds Himself responsible to work this out in me every moment if I only trust Him for it. Then I begin to understand the important phrase with which Paul begins and closes his Epistle to the Romans (Rom. 1: 5; 16: 26): ‘‘The obedience of faith.’’ Faith brings me to the Lord Jesus, not only to obtain the forgiveness of sin, but also that I may every moment enjoy the power which will make it possible for me, as a child of God, to abide in Him, and to be numbered among His obedient children — of whom it is written that, as He who has called them is holy, so they also may be holy in all manner of conversation. Everything depends on whether or not I believe on the whole Christ, with the fullness of His grace, that He will (not now and then but) every moment be the strength of my life. Such faith will lead to an obedience which will enable me to ‘‘ walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power.”’

The soul which feeds on such promises will experience now, instead of the disobedience of self-effort, what the obedience of faith means. All such promises have their measure, their certainty, and their strength in the Living Christ.