The Best Place to Start a Topic Like Obedience...

Today marks the beginning of a series called Crazy Obedience. You can read more about this series here, here, here, or here (just click one, it’s the same post located at different blogs). As a reminder there is a giveaway going on that ends tonight at midnight, so if you were wanting a chance at winning, do sign up!

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Photo Credit, words added by me

I feel hesitant to write on such a big topic… and one so widely spoken on and written about. But I know deep down in my knower, that this is exactly where I must start this series.

God's Love.

Vast. Immeasurable. Big. Wide. Deep. Unfathomable.

“And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep His love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.” Ephesians 3:18-19, NLT

I think of my kids. I remember potty training Addy: 9 months long and a whole lot of tears. And my daughter may have been stubborn. And she may have gotten it wrong for what seemed like a really long time. But my love never wavered. My patience was tested, my vocabulary was improved (because let’s not even go there with the things I really wanted to say after the 5th accident in one day), but my love was constant, steadfast, and immovable.

God’s love is like that. Constant. Steadfast. Immovable. You can’t earn it. Try to be worthy of it. You just have it.

I think this truth is a really important place to start in the pursuit of crazy obedience. Here’s my reasons:

You need to know that if you never do anything of any significance for God—never lead a soul to Christ, never lay hands on the sick, never give a large sum of money to the church—you and God can still be okay. This is not me saying to sit back on your blessed assurances and never do anything for the cause of Christ. This is me saying that you can’t earn God’s love. So often, the zeal of doing for Christ can warp into this “look at me and how much I am doing for God.” I say this because our own pride will turn wanting to live for Christ into a contest of accomplishments.
In remembering how much God’s loves me, I remember how much God loves everyone. The gang banger, the homeless beggar, the prostitute, the transvestite, the prisoner… and God doesn’t label them. He just loves.
One of my pastor friends had this on his facebook wall (I so swooped. Thanks Nathan!): You cannot give what you have not received. If you haven’t received God’s love, how can you share it??

Above all else, God wants your heart. Not your achievements.

God chooses to use us… earthen clay vessels so that we can testify to the surpassing greatness of God. God doesn’t need us. He chooses us. Your achievements mean nothing if you can’t manage to live knowing God.

“You’ll protest, ‘But we’ve known you all our lives!’ only to be interrupted with his abrupt, ‘Your kind of knowing can hardly be called knowing. You don’t know the first thing about me’.” Luke 13:26-27, MESS

Sometimes I can be a little type-A, and I totally struggle with trying to earn God's love. Sometimes I get wrapped up in people pleasing and in trying to add to my list of acheivements so that I look okay to everyone else. But what freedom is found in this simple message: God loves me and doesn't need me to do anything! God rewarded Mary who sat at His feet and got to know Him over Martha who toiled over cleaning and preparing and doing.

I stand back in awe of God. His deep Love; His upside-down, last-will-be-first kingdom; and the invitation to know--really know--the God of the universe.

Wow. We are offered the chance to KNOW Him.

So, I guess the question is: do you KNOW God? And do you know how much God loves you?

By Grace,

Amanda

Want to read more posts on this series? Click the graphic.

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