Is Obedience Enough?

Can authentic faith in God be reduced down to obedience?  Jesus did say, If you love me, you will keep my commandments (John 14:15, ESV), … Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you would enter life, keep the commandments (Matthew 19:17, ESV) and If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love (John 15:10, ESV).  It seems simple obedience to God’s commands is the essential key to unlocking God’s blessings.  But is that the full truth? 

Isaiah 1 describes the worship of the Jewish tribe of Judah as offering a “multitude of sacrifices” [how much is sacrificed today?] (v 11),  regular worship attendance (v 12), offering of incense [today this may look like very generous giving to God] and sacred celebrations of holy days, participating in special public assemblies to honor God (v 13), stretching out hands in worship and offered many prayers (v 15).  If we knew someone who practiced these things today, it is likely we would consider them very spiritual.  However, God severely rebuked these people, not for obedience to His precepts but for allowing their hearts to become distracted from Him while they obeyed His laws.  Their schizophrenic spiritual life was not acceptable to Him.  In Revelation 2,  again after Christ applauded their noble behavior, He warned the church at Ephesus that their heart was not invested in the right deeds they practiced and that unless they humbly turned their hearts totally around (repented) He would remove His presence from them.        

If you agonize over whether you are walking in God’s will for your life, it might be encouraging to know that unless you have chosen to blow off or rationalize what God’s word says about a matter or ignore His whispers, you are most likely already walking in God’s will.   So, relax.  To be clear, what God wants from you is NOT just your perfect outward words or deeds, but rather your deep, inner conviction and passion to follow what He whispers to you to say or do.  Living with that kind of heart results in right words and obedient behavior.  However, if you have chosen to do what you or others want instead of what God has already asked you to do; anxiety, confusion, frustration, independence and anger will constantly haunt you.  If that describes what you frequently experience, all you have to do is humble yourself and consciously and deliberately repent (let His Spirit turn your heart totally around) and start walking as you already know He wants you to walk.  Bottom line: He is looking at what prompts our initiative—the focus of our heart, not just sheer obedience to a set of rules even if they are in His Word.  When the heart is right with God, obedience and happiness follows like a shadow wherever you go.

Note this, the person who genuinely seeks for God’s guidance must never forget that even if he/she were to do all the things God commands, that person may still NOT be the person God longs for her/him to be. Paul explained it this way, “the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” (2 Co 3:6b , ESV). An obsession merely to do all God commands may be the very thing that separates that person from what He calls him/her to be.  The Pharisees were examples of this.

Dallas Willard wrote, what God wants us to do is very important, of course, and we must be careful to learn how to know it and do it, but it is never enough by itself to allow us to understand and enter the radiant life before the shining face of God that is offered to us in the grace of the gospel — a life pleasing to him, in view of which He can say, “This is my beloved child, in whom I am well pleased.

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