The Cost of Obedience

Sometimes it feels like walking in obedience comes with a great cost. The cost of being misunderstood. Being judged. Of walking a narrow path that comes with trials and hardship. Sometimes walking alone.

Obedience is not always easy and smooth. God will give us the grace to walk where He calls us to, but sometimes He leads us into the refining fire or through the valley of the shadow of death. It’s uncomfortable, scary, and unknown. 

It’s all purposeful and helps to expose and remove our flesh, build a deeper dependence on God and shape us into who He is calling us to be.

A recent devotional I read noted, “Obedience is easier when you remember that God cares for you.” The circumstances we may be put into – whether through our choices or life happening to us – will feel and look impossible or make us start to doubt and turn back or even step ahead of God.

But we have to hold onto who we know God to be and what God has said. This does not mean it’s easy. We have to let go of our own understanding, let go of needing to know everything and let go of control to often do things that just don’t make sense. 

Can we trust God over our own understanding of a situation? How do we hold onto the truth of God’s character and heart?

• By staying connected to community.
• By spending daily time in the word.
• And by building authentic relationship with Him in the secret place.

Just because we are obedient doesn’t mean we have to pretend it’s easy or that we are enjoying it. We can lament. We can tell God – this is hard, I feel weak, scared, unsure. I want to trust you, but I’m struggling to.

Psalm 22 is a great example, where David laments to God. He cries out asking why God has forsaken him?

Psalm 22:1-2 – “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish? My God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, but I find no rest.”

And then He states who God is even in the midst of His struggles.

Psalm 22:3-5 – “Yet you are enthroned as the Holy One; you are the one Israel praises. In you our ancestors put their trust; they trusted and you delivered them. To you they cried out and were saved; in you they trusted and were not put to shame.”

In the valley I’ve been walking through, it feels like everything has been tested. I’ve had to hold onto the truth of God’s word even when it’s felt so hard to believe as the truth in the midst of what I’ve been battling. 

Everything in me is being tested.

And what gives us the strength to push through in obedience when everything is being tested? It’s not duty. It’s not will power. It’s love. Our love for God. 

This is exactly what kept Jesus on the cross. He didn’t want to die and go through what He went through. He prayed for God to remove what He was asking Him to do. But He brought His honest feelings to God and He submitted them and surrendered and said “but not my will, but yours be done.” 

And in the midst of betrayal, beatings, humiliation, being spit on, mocked, falsely accused, abandoned, suffering, misunderstanding, and pain – He stayed. To lay down His life for His friends (John 15:13). To die for the sins of the world.

Luke 22:42 – “saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.”

On this journey with God, people may make fun of you, believe lies about you, falsely accuse you, hurt you, walk away from you, and more. It’s hard and it hurts, I won’t deny that. But what’s helped me get through each day, is holding onto God’s love. His love for me and the love I have grown for Him. To trust in what I believe to be true about Him from what I’ve studied and what I’ve experienced.

Knowing that God is good and that He is working good out of what I’m going through gives me hope to hold on. To know that better days are coming and that there is something God is doing that I may not yet understand. To trust in what I cannot yet see. 

Love kept Jesus on the cross. And love can give us strength to walk in whatever God is calling us to do.