“To obey God, is not so much our duty as our privilege; his commands carry meat in the mouth of them. He bids us repent; and why? That our sins may be blotted out. He commands us to believe: and why? That we may be saved. There is love in every command: as if a king should bid one of his subjects dig in a gold mine, and then take the gold to himself.”
thomas watson
Reflection:
So often, it is too easy to have a precarious relationship with obeying God. We learn from the gospel that we are saved by grace and that we must not attempt to save ourselves by works. But if we are not careful, Satan will tempt us to believe that because salvation is not by obedience, somehow obedience itself is bad—that if we focus too much on obedience, we will spoil grace. But Satan is a liar.
In reality, obedience is always good. What really needs to happen in our hearts to keep us from trying to earn our salvation through obedience is not to stop obeying, but to start seeing the kind and fatherly heart of God. When we truly believe that God is our Father, we will see salvation in a less transactional way. Additionally, we will start seeing God’s commands as good and helpful words from our Father.
Make no mistake—God’s commands are demands. We owe it to God to do what He says, and He commands us as our Lord. But if His commands are always for our good, then we can envision His commands as a king demanding that we take the treasure for ourselves. If we struggle with obedience, we don’t need to run from obedience; we need to run to the heart of our Father God.
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