Obey the Light

Beloved, did you know that a tremendous portion of our understanding of Jesus and our ability to worship our God stems from our willingness to obey Him? Do you ever long to understand more of the things of God? Do you long to love Him more and worship Him with a passion that you just don't have and can't seem to muster? Do you ponder His love and long to even begin to grasp it? We won't be able to completely, by any stretch of the imagination, begin to understand such a Love this side of heaven. But God does want us to have Light and Truth in this life so we can, after salvation, spend the balance of our time here on this earth proclaiming that precious love of Christ to everyone we meet. If you are a child of God, and you obey the light He gives you, then He will give you even more light. And that truth is what you can share with the unsaved world. The psalmist prayed in Psalm 119:18 "Open my eyes, that I may behold wonderful things from your law". John MacArthur puts it this way: "Believers receive additional light of truth as they grow in obedience and maturity in the Lord. As believers remain faithful, God reveals more and more light until they "have an abundance.(Matt.13:12) The longer believers serve Christ, the more He reveals His truth and power to them". Read 1 Cor. 2:9-10. One of God's most precious blessings is knowing Jesus more and in knowing Him more, we have a greater capacity to worship Him. Think of someone that you admire greatly. Think about every time you see something else good about them, your admiration grows. Or think about the special someone that you love, like a boyfriend/girlfriend,or spouse. The more you get to know them, the more you love them. The more you understand them, the closer your heart grows to them. Now realize that they are human and they will sin, they will fail and disappoint you from time to time. But Jesus is perfect. The more you know of Him, it only increases your love and devotion to this perfect Savior! He never fails you and never disappoints you. You may become disappointed with something He allows in your life, but this is sin on your part. The more we understand His holiness and His perfect sovereign choices, the less we will even think to question His goodness. Questioning Jehovah God only says that I think I know better than He does. It is pride and it is stubbornness and selfishness and it is sin. The Holy Spirit will, through our obedience to His word and the light He gives, give you more light of understanding of your God. But if the Holy Spirit shines His perfect light on an area of your life that is sin, and you don't obey that light, you will not receive more light until you submit to His authority over your life and over any and all sin. But once you obey, He blesses you with the tremendous gift of more and more of your Savior! What a trade-off, huh? You let go of your grip on a sin that is doing such damage to your life, your testimony and your walk with God, and are given the added blessing of MORE of what is important, JESUS!! And don't think that God is being overly hard on you when He points out those sins. When you are saved, ALL of your sins, past, present and future are covered by the precious blood of Jesus Christ. Every sin is paid for and you are declared justified before a holy God because He sees you through the righteous robes of His precious Son. Your sins are forgiven, never to be charged to your account again. Then begins the sanctification process. It starts the moment you are saved. The Holy Spirit immediately comes to live inside of you. This sanctification will continue all the days of your life on earth. It won't be until heaven that we are glorified. But right here and now, from the moment of salvation, the Holy Spirit starts His work in your life. If He, in that very moment of salvation, laid every single one of your sins on your heart and told you to deal with them on the spot, you would be overwhelmed. God knows perfectly when to reveal His light on every one of our sins and then HE starts the changing process as soon as we are obedient to realization about that sin. His timing is perfect. If He reveals a sin to us even one day before the proper time, then He would be going against His own perfect plan. All children of God know what I am talking about. There is always growth in your life when you are walking in right relationship with your Master. He never leaves you unattended. He's always growing you, if you are obedient to Him. It still amazes me when the Holy Spirit so lovingly reveals sin in my life that I never even realized before. I enjoy walking around downtown. I have a set route and it involves walking down Main St. across several stoplights. When I'm walking I just come up to the intersection and look both ways and keep going. None of the streets are wide or have much traffic so most times I can just keep walking. No big deal, been doing it for years. Then the Holy Spirit, through my son, points out to me that I am breaking the law. One day I was pointing out to my son that he sins against God when he breaks the laws of the land, like speeding. He proceeded to ask me what about my breaking the law when I cross those streets against a red light. WOW!! BAM!! RIGHT IN THE HEART!! The Holy Spirit, in that very instant, convicted me of something that I have never, ever even thought of. So there it was. Jehovah God had shined His perfect light on a sin exactly at the time when He was ready to reveal it to me. And therein lies my choice...do I obey this Light, or do I ignore it, make excuses for it, complain that it isn't fair to make my walk less enjoyable, or even get angry for God being God, and being perfect and wanting nothing less of me, His child? Jesus said in Matt 5:48 "You are to be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect". Jesus never said to just do the best you can. He never patted sin on the back or made excuses for it. God NEVER winks at sin, ANY sin. Every little "tiny" sin in our eyes that we commit cost His precious Son more than we can fathom this side of heaven! It cost Jesus everything! Do you know that if you only committed the one little sin of yours that you tend to overlook, that Jesus still would have had to suffer and die for it in order for God to forgive you? Just that one! Just me knowingly breaking the laws of the land cost Jesus dearly. Nothing, no sin in our lives, no matter how small we think they are, will God ever just turn a blind eye to. The longer we live on this earth as Christians, the more we will have our sins revealed to us by the Holy Spirit. It is then our decision whether or not we will obey this Light that He shines in the darkest little corners of our lives. Obedience is the key to our walk with Christ. It is key to our communion with our heavenly Father. And God's standards are perfect. When Jesus kept the religious leaders from stoning the woman caught in adultery, the last thing He said to her was "Go and sin no more". (John 8:11) He didn't tell her to run along and do the best she could and try not to commit the "big" sins. His standard of holiness is perfect. And that is what He commanded of us in Matt 5:48. We will never be perfect this side of heaven, but it should be our deepest desire to become more and more like our precious Savior, and He is perfect. We should grieve over every single sin in our lives that the Holy Spirit points out to us in order to make us more like Jesus. In the few years that I have been saved, the Holy Spirit has done this Light shinning in my life time and time again. And obedience is so wonderful because I am so lavishly rewarded with more and more of my Master and King. It makes me giddy, truly. I have things written in my bible and in my devotionals asking the Holy Spirit of God to "do it again, God". I tell him that I want more and more opportunities to obey, and the harder the better!! And yes, sometimes I fail and then wish I hadn't asked. But He picks me up and the opportunity presents itself again. The JOY, the pure overwhelming pleasure of such communion with my Husband is a great reward for my obedience. Wisdom, knowledge, truth, understanding, discernment, on and on goes the gracious list of blessings from the Lord of life and glory, if you will only obey His voice. If you will obey the promptings from the Holy Spirit when He shines that Light on the areas of your life that displease Him and stand in opposition to His holiness, He will bless you with more of your Savior. Obey Him, child of God, and your reward will be great!