Following God (Part Two)

Clearly, following God is not something we naturally do. We teach children to be good, not bad. Left to ourselves we go astray like sheep. Left to our own devices we look only to our own interests. Not all our intentions are only evil all the time, but that bent towards doing the wrong thing so easily dominates, whether we want to be good or not. God did the hard work. While we were His enemies, Christ died for us. While we scoffed at Him on the cross, Christ prayed, “Father, forgive them. They know not what they do.” We pursued Him to death and He allowed Himself to be led to the slaughter. We didn’t love God. But He loved us. It’s no wonder we find it hard to obey God sometimes. Our very being naturally rebels at the thought. But He has placed His Holy Spirit in the believer to give us a desire to do it. With Him we have a fighting chance.

“When we walk with the Lord in the light of His Word,

What a glory He sheds on our way!

While we do His good will, He abides with us still,

And with all who will trust and obey.

Then in fellowship sweet we will sit at His feet.

Or we'll walk by His side in the way.

What He says we will do, where He sends we will go;

Never fear, only trust and obey.”

Psalm 33 places the spotlight on God and shows us why He is worth following.

The words of the Lord are true,

   and all his works are dependable.

The Lord loves what is righteous and just;

   his constant love fills the earth.

The Lord created the heavens by his command,

   the sun, moon, and stars by his spoken word.

Psalms 33:4‭-‬6

His word is upright. His works are faithful. He is a God who can be trusted. He won’t change His mind every five minutes or tell us one thing but do another. His character and His commands are consistent. He is reliable. He never changes. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. God loves righteousness and justice. His goodness is there for all to see in the world He has created. God is on the side of right. He wants fairness in its fullest sense to prevail. He wants humanity to do what is good and to love one another. The fault lies with us that we don’t always do it. He is Creator of all. How can the creature be so obnoxious and ungrateful to God? Humanity, in effect, sticks its middle finger in the air and shouts “up yours! I’m the master of my fate! I can do anything I want. It’s my body! It’s my life! Butt out!” When we look at the character of God and the character of man, the contrast should be clear. Is it any wonder that following God can be hard, when everything in us propels us to do a Jonah and run away in the other direction? And yet, with God’s Holy Spirit in us, it is possible. We have been rescued from this body of death.

For the law of the Spirit, which brings us life in union with Christ Jesus, has set me free from the law of sin and death. Those who live as their human nature tells them to, have their minds controlled by what human nature wants. Those who live as the Spirit tells them to, have their minds controlled by what the Spirit wants. To be controlled by human nature results in death; to be controlled by the Spirit results in life and peace. And so people become enemies of God when they are controlled by their human nature; for they do not obey God's law, and in fact they cannot obey it. Those who obey their human nature cannot please God. But you do not live as your human nature tells you to; instead, you live as the Spirit tells you to—if, in fact, God's Spirit lives in you. Whoever does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ lives in you, the Spirit is life for you because you have been put right with God, even though your bodies are going to die because of sin. If the Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from death, lives in you, then he who raised Christ from death will also give life to your mortal bodies by the presence of his Spirit in you.

Romans 8:2‭, ‬5‭-‬11

I think a good principle for following the Lord is to do it because it is the right thing to do - because God is worth following for His own sake. If we want to follow Him because of what we can get out of Him, I think we are setting ourselves up for disappointment. Not because we can’t trust Him to keep His promises, but because if He doesn’t do what we want Him to do when we want Him to do it, then we’ll get down and angry and bitter. To love Him for His own sake is the way to go. Seek first His kingdom, then all other things will be given us. He isn’t going to hold anything back. “If God is for us, who can be against us?  Certainly not God, who did not even keep back his own Son, but offered him for us all! He gave us his Son—will he not also freely give us all things?” (Romans 8:31-32)

I want to close with some more words from Psalm 33, which ends with a prayer.

The Lord watches over those who obey him,

   those who trust in his constant love.

He saves them from death;

   he keeps them alive in times of famine.

We put our hope in the Lord;

   he is our protector and our help.

We are glad because of him;

   we trust in his holy name.

May your constant love be with us, Lord,

   as we put our hope in you.

Psalms 33:18‭-‬22

Following God (Part One)

We know from the Old Testament that the Israelites had a bit of a patchy history when it came to following the Lord. But they are by no means unique in that. What we may think of as the established church hasn’t always done what is right in the eyes of God. Child abuse by priests, covered up by bishops. The torture and murder of those they saw as heretics. Conversions at the point of a sword. Splitting over seemingly minor issues sometimes. And what about that early church to whom the apostles preached and Paul and others wrote their letters? A pristine, pure body of believers? Sadly not. It’s clear that there were real problems from what we read in Paul's letters, not to mention the letters to the churches in Revelation. Quarrels over the best leader to follow. Taking each other to court. Turning to false gospels. Gossiping and backbiting. I bet that doesn’t even sound like a big deal to us. It may not have been widespread but it was bad enough to mention. So, how about us? Are we any good at following God? Or is our devotion patchy, too?

In Numbers 9:15-23, we see one of those occasions on which the Israelites were very obedient. God directed them using a cloud which appeared over the tabernacle. When the cloud lifted, that was the sign to move. When it settled down, that was the place to camp. Now, I don’t know about you, but on the face of it that looks a bit easy. To have such a clear sign from God should be a doddle to obey. I wonder if this counts as “baby steps”?

Sometimes people will strangely say it's hard to know God's will. “You know what would make it really easy to obey? If God just told us straight out in plain words what He wanted us to do.” Yeah, He did that and we have it recorded in the Bible. Most of the time it's not really that difficult to know what He wants from us. But why accept the plain Word of God when you can complicate things to the point that everything can be objected to or interpreted in many contradictory ways? We sometimes seem to want to make things hard on ourselves. “The Bible is a big book and hard to understand! How about if God just came down and stood in front of us and spoke to us?” Yep, He did that as well! And we have His words recorded in the gospels. That didn't always go down well either. Even though God has spoken directly and often clearly, that doesn’t make following Him easier. Here's the problem: people don't always like what He’s telling us and we may decide we ain’t gonna do it. We find ways of saying “He didn’t really mean that”. It might well be clear what following Him entails, but it needs a heart and will to actually do it.

In our days we don’t have a cloud directing us or a physical Jesus on the ground to wander around with. And as we see in the Bible, neither of these guaranteed obedience either. Our task is potentially harder and potentially easier. We have to walk by faith and not by sight. But we have a written word to consult and the Holy Spirit of God living within us. Blessed are those who haven’t seen but believe anyway.

I don’t want to be down on the Israelites, the early church or the established church. There is likely often more good than bad. The problem is that the bad taints and spoils the good. I am very conscious that I also sin and fall short of the glory of God, along with everyone else. “Who can understand the human heart? There is nothing else so deceitful; it is too sick to be healed.” (Jeremiah 17:9) So sick, we need a new heart. Chipping away at the heart of stone won’t work. “Everyone has sinned and is far away from God's saving presence. But by the free gift of God's grace all are put right with him through Christ Jesus, who sets them free.” (Romans 3:23-24) I know my shortcomings and how desperately I need the blood of Jesus to cleanse me. I wish it wasn’t so. When we come to take communion I often thank Him for dying for our sins and wishing that I hadn’t made it necessary.

As a hymnwriter put it:

“Bearing shame and scoffing rude, In my place condemned He stood,

Sealed my pardon with His blood: Halellujah! What a Saviour!

Guilty, vile and helpless we; Spotless Lamb of God was He;

Full atonement! Can it be? Halellujah! What a Saviour!”

And another:

“And can it be that I should gain An int’rest in the Saviour’s blood?

Died He for me, who caused His pain— For me, who Him to death pursued?

Amazing love! How can it be, That Thou, my God, shouldst die for me?”

For when we were still helpless, Christ died for the wicked at the time that God chose. God has shown us how much he loves us—it was while we were still sinners that Christ died for us! (Romans 5:6‭, ‬8)

And God showed his love for us by sending his only Son into the world, so that we might have life through him. This is what love is: it is not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the means by which our sins are forgiven. (1 John 4:9‭-‬10)