OBEDIENCE - BY JOHN ISENHOWER
Obedience might be a thing we don't understand. We have been brought up in a world where there is no accountability. We are raised by our grandparents or a school system or babysitter, so our parents can both work 60 hours per week to maintain worldly standards. Eventually, that causes unfaithfulness, and/or stress on the marriage, which ends in divorce. Then we are down to a broken home, being bounced back and forth like a ping pong ball. At that point, we are counting down the days until we are 18, and life will be so much better. We reach this dream age and we realize, we haven't been taught one thing, except, it's all about us. We don't know how to love, we don't know how to share, we don't know how to take care of ourselves, much less the child we are having with the girl we are not married to. We move right to the government, who will continue to teach us to take, take, take. This seems to be ok with people because they have not been taught anything different. There is no model of right and wrong in the world. God and His word has become so diluted that we, as Christians, are confused on what our lives are supposed look like. We do not realize that we are supposed to be modeling obedience and accountability. We are called to stand up and be different than the world, so those who don't know Christ can be directed to Him.
Through our obedience, we need to be careful to realize that God has put us in His spotlight or others to see. Not to see us, but Christ in us. God created us for His purpose, not our own. He should live in the driver seat of our lives, not the passenger seat. God should most definitely not live in the back seat, which is where He ends up most of the time. This is the reason we spend so much time trying to justify sin, instead of guiding others in the direction of repenting of theirs. I am thankful that God gave His Son to be a perfect example of the live we should be living. There is no if, ands, or buts, about it. If we truly look at the words of Jesus Christ for what they are, we either choose to obey or disobey. There is clearly no in between.
John Isenhower is the director of the Knoxville chapter of Relevant ministries, a homeless outreach. His passion for sharing the Gospel with the homeless has motivated me step outside my comfort zone, for which I am very grateful. John's true passion is evangelism and discipleship and I am proud to call him my friend.
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