When we can wrap our minds around the concept that Obedience to God begins and ends with our understanding of God's paramount hearts desire, which is to have a loving personal fellowship with each and every one of us - His creation, throughout our lives, and we then cultivate that relationship on a daily basis, then and only then can we begin to master our ensuring our bodies are obedient to Him.
Obedience to God's will and His ways is by no means anything we can achieve by our own will-power or anything we can come up with by ourselves.
There's only one road to Obedience for all who are serious about living the overcomers life that Jesus Christ wrought for all mankind on the cross.
Just as Jesus Christ overcame sin, the worlds evil system and the devils manipulation over His creation, that the sinful nature we were born into would be done away with, so also can we overcome the evil desires of our flesh by empowering God's Spirit within us to subdue our innate sinful nature.
In Psalm 119:1 to 3, it is written:
1. Blessed are those whose ways are blameless, who walk according to the law of the Lord.
2. Blessed are those who keep his statutes and seek him with all their heart
3. they do no wrong but follow his ways.
From this we can deduce that the Road to Obedience so that we do no wrong but follow God's ways, as is His will for us and that should also be our ultimate hearts desire, is thus:
1. To seek him with all our heart, by constantly meditating on His statutes that we may be abreast with what He desires we do per time, and
2. To keep his statutes by choosing to walk according to His law of love concerning our relationship with Him and our fellow men,, rather than following our selfish fleshly desires, that we may be blameless.
I'm sure we all remember the account of the time our Lord Jesus visited Martha and Mary, and how Martha well-meaningly went about dutifully preparing to entertain the Lord in a grand style but was annoyed at how her sister Mary chose not to help her but instead sat at the feet of Jesus, that she may learn from his wealth of wisdom.
If we can, then I'm sure we can also recollect the reply the Lord gave Martha when she confronted Jesus about his lack of concern of how Mary wouldn't help her wait on him, as their guest.
Jesus, in his reply to Mary gave this profound reply to not just the shock and amazement of Martha but to many, like I, who came across the story when he said in Luke 10:41to 42, “Martha, Martha,” you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”
This helps us understand that God's command as recorded in Psalm 110:1 to king David, “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.” is all we'll ever need to adhere to as disciples of God, to overcome and win the battle we are all facing against our sinful nature, the world and the devil.
In Leviticus 19:1 to 2, it was also recorded that Lord said to Moses, “Speak to the entire assembly of Israel and say to them: Be holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy."
While this, like many other commands God expects men to adhere to, may seem outlandish and a mission impossible to a lot of us because of our inordinate belief in the sway that sinful nature holds over mankind, the truth is that as in 1 Thessalonians 5:24, "the one who calls (us) is faithful, and he will do it."
We have to believe that the God who gave the command also has the ability to empower us to attain the level He desires us to operate in, only then we can truly be rest assured that our complete confidence in God's word concerning His desire for us to perpetually choose to live in obedience to Him and His Word will be matched by His empowerment through His Holy Spirit, resident within us to be faithful to His Commandments.
Shalom!
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