Month: August 2018

Obedience is the disciple’s pathway to Freedom.  On the resurrection side of the cross, obedience is not a pathway to righteousness (we are declared righteous in Christ) but the pathway of freedom to love and know Christ (John 14:21).

We have previously discussed two traits of a disciple:  Comprehensive Alignment and Sacrificial Allegiance.  Another indicator Jesus gave of His apprentices is found in John 8:31-32.

“So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free” (John 8:31-32 NASB).

I call this trait “Faithful Obedience”.  In this blog we will explore its meaning and the promised results.

“Continue (abide) in My Word” implies alignment to the will of God or in other words, obedience.  However, the term obedience carries some negative connotations for us today so we need to relook at what it means.

Webster:  Obedience is not synonymous with servility but being merely a proper submission to authority. That which duty requires implies dignity of conduct rather than servility.  Obedience may be voluntary or involuntary.

Biblical obedience is more than adhering to a list of rules or commands.  It is alignment to the revealed will of God in all of its various forms including commands, desires, values, promises, and purposes.

The people Jesus was speaking to in John 8 were apparently receptive and friendly.  They probably considered themselves to be His disciples.  However, Jesus challenged them with the verb “continue”.  It can also be translated as abide, dwell, endure, or remain.  Three implications of the verb “continue” can help clarify this trait of apprenticeship.

A disciple is one whose response to the Word is:

     1.  Personal (first-hand, individual)

There is an interesting set of instructions that Moses gives Israel as they prepare to enter the Promised Land.  In a prophetic anticipation of Israel being led by a king, Moses gives three things every king should not do and one thing he must do.  He should not multiply horses, wives or personal wealth (Deut. 17:16-17), but he must:

“…write for himself a (personal) copy of this law on a scroll in the presence of the Levitical priests. It shall be with him and he shall read it all the days of his life, that he may learn to fear the LORD his God, by carefully observing all the words of this law and these statutes”  (Deut. 16:18-19).

Sadly, Israel’s kings did what they should not do and did not do what they should have done.  Perhaps this is one reason for the rocky road Israel traveled throughout her history as a nation.  Imagine what would have happened if every king had copied the sacred Scripture by hand as he interacted with the Levitical priests and read it every day of his life.  The promised result would have been kings who feared God and were obedient to His Word.

When my father died, I kept his Bible which was worn, marked up, and stained.  Although I couldn’t read all his faded notations, they represented how very personal the Word was to him.  For my dad Scripture was not a textbook but a personal letter from God that required reading and rereading and most importantly, was valued as the source for life-change.

The Psalmist tells us to “Hide” God’s Word in our hearts.  Hiding involves more than just rote memory.  It involves making it personal, internal, part of our lives.

     2. Intentional (active, planned, purposeful)

“Now the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true” (Acts 17:11 NIV).

Disciples intentionally plan to abide in His Word.  They do not leave it to chance or just when they feel like it.  Early in my discipleship journey I learned five methods to intentionally abide in the Word.  They are to hear it, read it, study it, memorize it, and meditate on it.  Those methods are just as critical for me today as they were then.

Each of these five methods connect us to Scripture in a different way.  We need to have a plan to use all five.  It is not surprising that the hardest ones seem to be the most effective for life change.

     3.  Consistent (faithful, continuous, and persistent)

I am reminded of the statement:  “Successful people do consistently what ordinary people do occasionally”.

Consistency brings payoff in the development of spiritual habits.  When a practice becomes a habit, we move from a focus on mechanics to the intended results.  It is the same whether the habit is going to the gym or memorizing Scripture.

A great picture of consistency is seen in the way God provided manna for the Israelites in the desert.  God provided this miraculous provision of nutrition, but the people had to gather it each day and only enough for the day.  Some tried to store it for future use, but it didn’t work.  Although God provided enough for each day, they had to personally, intentionally, and consistently go and get it.

A disciple does not rely on yesterday’s manna.  He knows he needs a fresh word from God.  The habit of a daily appointment with God (AWG) in His Word, is one of the essential practices of men and women of God down through history.  Early in my own spiritual journey consistency in His Word came as a result of reading a small booklet called “7 Minutes with God”.  The message was “it is better to spend a little bit of time (7 minutes) every day than a lot occasionally.”  Start with seven and when it becomes a habit, it is easy to expand to ten.

In our John 8:31-32 passage, Jesus highlighted three specific results of continuing in His Word: Proof of discipleship, knowledge of truth, and freedom.

“You shall know the truth and the truth will set you free” (John 8:32).

Jesus goes on to explain that He is not referring to freedom from physical slavery or ignorance, but freedom from the slavery of sin, Satan’s lies, and the painful deception of self-rule.

We are embarrassingly vulnerable to the world’s deceptions unless we continue in the truth of God’s Word.  We are, like the kings of Israel, easily led astray.  The life of a disciple is marked by the spiritual freedom that comes through alignment to the truth of Scripture.

 Trait:  Faithful Obedience

A disciple is one who consistently makes the Scripture the final authority for all of life, seeking to know, understand, and align his/her life to it.

Questions for reflection:

1.  Which of the 5 methods of Scripture intake to you need to develop at this point in your spiritual journey?
2. Are there places in Scripture where you do not feel “at home”? Identify a place and develop a plan to explore it more.

Many of my generation were raised on the genre of TV westerns.  One of the familiar pictures of the real cowboy was his ability to take a wild horse, put him in a corral, saddle him up, get on and then stay on.  It was called “breaking” a horse.  If the cowboy stayed on, eventually the horse would give up and submit to the authority and dominance of a new master.

Unfortunately, many of us have this image when it comes to the second trait of a certified disciple:  sacrificial allegiance.  As previously discussed in Blog 37, sacrificial allegiance requires submitting to the authority of Christ.  We described it as lowering the flag of ego and replacing it with the flag of Christ and His kingdom.   However, it is important we do not interpret the lordship (or authority) of Christ as God wanting to “break us” and dominate us into submission.  This false idea was, regrettably, part of my early thinking and created within me a reluctance to follow Christ.

Fortunately, there has emerged another method for training horses that has gained traction in the horse world.  Thanks to pioneers like Monty Roberts, John Lyons, and Buck Brannaman, “natural horsemanship” or “resistance-free training” has become widely accepted.  Although this philosophy of horse training was popularized by Robert Redford in the movie “The Horse Whisperer”, it has actually been around for a long time.

This method of training builds on the understanding of how a horse is wired.  A horse in the wild is controlled by fear.  The only protection it has against predators is to flee.  Since anything other than another horse is a potential predator, the range horse is cautious and suspicious of anything unfamiliar.

Another important trait is that horses are herd animals.  They desire and seek out companionship.  A horse in the wild that has lost its herd will seek out and attempt to join up with another herd.

Monte Roberts observed this as a young boy watching wild mustangs.  He noticed that there was a process by which a horse would approach a new herd and seek to “join up”.  Roberts noticed that when a horse approached a new herd, the dominant mare would come out to meet it.  They would go through a series of gestures where the newcomer would acknowledge the leadership of the lead mare.   Once they touched (“joined up”), the newcomer would be accepted as part of the herd.  Using the same dynamics, Roberts turned this observation into a method for training horses.

Applying this method in a 50 foot diameter round pen, good horse trainers can take a wild horse and within a few hours, train the horse to trust and respond to the trainer without any kind of force or intimidation.  The basic idea is to convince the horse that the trainer is not a threat and is safe to “join up” with.

The trainer begins with letting the horse run around the perimeter of the round pen.  Once the horse concludes it can’t get out and that the person in the center of the round pen is not a threat, it will quit running and turn to face the trainer.  The trainer will slowly approach the horse until they can touch:  join up. Once that touch has been made, the trainer can walk away and the horse will willingly follow.

Once the horse willingly “joins up” with the trainer, the training process can begin.  It involves desensitizing the horse to its natural fears (surprises, loud noises, fire) and sensitizing it to the desires of the trainer.  A trained horse will learn to respond to even the slightest cues of the rider.

One of the most beautiful demonstrations of this training process is to watch horses performing dressage.   This equestrian event made famous in Austria is almost like a dance between horse and rider.  In the show arena the horse goes through a series of maneuvers and gaits much like a dance routine.  To the casual eye, it looks like the horse is doing it all on its own, but in reality the rider is giving the horse subtle cues that come from leg and hand pressure as well as  delicate weight shifts.   The horse has become so sensitized to the desires of the rider that together they appear to work as one.

It seems to me that this form of training is what God is doing with us.  Rather than trying to break us, He is trying to train us by teaching us to trust Him.  Once we overcome our fear and “join up”, He begins the process of desensitizing us to the habits and lies we have grown accustomed to and sensitizing us to the cues He wants to use to develop our God given potential, “taking us from the range to the arena by way of the round pen”.  I picture Christ standing in the center of the round pen and saying to us:

“Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. For My yoke  (the personal teaching principles of a rabbi) is easy and My burden is light” (Matt 11:28-30).

He does not use coercion, manipulation, or force.  He simply seeks our trust in the goodness of His character.

A wild horse on the range can run, reproduce, and eat, but it is capable of so much more.  With the right trainer, it can accomplish many useful tasks and even perform before royalty.  When a horse gives up its “freedom” and learns to trust the trainer, it becomes truly free to be all it was created to be.

A broke horse does what it has to do, but a trained horse does what it can do to please its owner, responding to even the subtle cues.

“May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer” (Ps. 19:14).  

 A trained disciple learns to focus on Him (Heb. 12:2), sensitive to the gentle touch, the quiet voice, and the tender gaze that comes from His Word and Spirit.

“I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you should go; I will counsel you with My eye upon you” (Ps. 32:8).

Trust is the foundation for God’s “natural horsemanship”.  God is not out to break us but to develop us.   Learning to trust overcomes the natural response to flee perceived danger.  Through trust we learn that our greatest fears are unwarranted.  We learn that life under His training is where we can experience our greatest fulfillment and freedom.

Questions for reflection:

1. Describe a time when you responded to a gentle cue of God’s direction. How did it make you feel?
2. Describe how you have been “sensitized” and/or “desensitized” along your journey of discipleship?