Our Call to Obedience

In my return home, I've been confronted with the concept of obedience in a couple different forms. In Dietrich Bonhoeffer's book The Cost of Discipleship he addresses the entangled yet beautifully orchestrated relationship of faith and obedience. The apostle Peter in 1 Peter 1, a passage I'm currently memorizing, addresses God's elect who have been chosen for the purpose of obedience to Christ.

Merriam Webster defines obedience as the act of submission to restraint or command of authority; or more simply put, doing what you are told to do. Certainly I'm familiar with this word in regards to obeying my parents or obeying the law, but I've lately been challenged by its implications towards my life as a Christian. What does it mean to be obedient to Christ as Peter wrote? Am I a true disciple in that my obedience of God's word leads to faith and faith to a greater desire for obedience?

I don't know.

Or maybe I do but the answers scare me. Obedience, especially obedience to Christ as a mark of true discipleship, demands sacrifice. The very definition contains the idea of submission, a dying to oneself and one's desires and comforts. It means acknowledging the authority of another in my life, that I am not my own and cannot live as such. And in the pridefulness of my heart, that is a lot to bear under.

I think the truth is I fear obedience because it seems like a loss of freedom. In my mind it means becoming weak, blindly following the regulations of another. And I also fear it because it is hard. Obeying God's will for my life could mean going where I don't particularly want to go, or even in some cases staying when I don't want to stay. It can mean heartache, discouragement, frustration, weariness, isolation, grief.

But the fact remains that as a follower of Christ, I am compelled to obey. Indeed, it is my calling to obey; the very reason why I have been chosen by the foreknowledge of God the Father and made able through the sanctifying work of the Spirit as Peter also writes. Obedience to God, to obey him and delight in him forever, is why I was created. It is my purpose, the state in which I will be most fulfilled.

By God's grace I want to choose the path of obedience, the straight and narrow, which leads in the end to the words "well done, good and faithful servant." God grant us all the strength and courage to choose this glorious call to obedience.