Obedience

"Obedience brings blessings, disobedience brings pain..." ~ Mario and Lynelle Zandstra

Ten summers ago I was a nanny for a precious family.  Towards the end of the summer, I was asked to keep their kids for a week.  It really meant that I was responsible for 5 of 7 of them.  It was a great week, and we had a ton of fun (pizza, sailing, etc.)  It was a dream with some serious redirecting and patience...then laundry needed to be done and the house needed to be cleaned at the end of the week.  Amidst getting everything put away and back together, one of the tweens at the time lied to me about putting her laundry away.  She had thrown it behind a chair downstairs, and I found it hours after telling her to put it away.  I was SO angry.  I didn't even know how to deal with her.  I spent most of my summer asking myself how the parents would have handled situations because they were leaders, pastors, gracious, godly people and I did not want to screw their kids up in one quick sweep of summer. They got home that night and I was still hot.  Very hot.  The mom sat me down and on the front porch and lovingly told me that while her daughter had lied...it wasn't about me.  She had grieved the Holy Spirit.  It wasn't personal.  Man, she was right.  Her daughter's lie to me had nothing, nothing to do with me.  It had everything to do with her walk with the Lord.  And with that understanding and approach, I could usher her to the throne of grace and love and speak Truth out of love.  Anger would never do that.  It changed everything for me.  And with that I left and sat in a dining hall all alone for hours journaling what I had learned about Jesus, parenthood, love, etc that summer.  And I was undone.  But I am often reminded about disobedience and the grieving of the Holy Spirit.

Now I have two girls.  And one is three.  And she is passionate, funny, and wants to know the WHY of everything.  She responds so much more to being ushered and led to throne of Grace then any yelling, anger, or reasoning. 

But this post has NOTHING to do with parenting my girls.  It has everything to do with me and my journey into obedience myself.

A few weeks ago, I began a journey into obedience with the Lord that if you had asked me a month ago was very insignificant to most spiritual aspects of life. 

It has looked like:

• Starting a new eating and exercising program that includes a cleanse every few weeks
• Making my bed every day
• when something is not in its proper place, putting it there at the time that I see/notice it
• wearing real clothes every day as opposed to yoga pants and a t-shirt
• showering and having quiet time before the girls wake up in the mornings (which means waking up at 6:00am)
• putting on make-up before I leave the house most days

Now before I get any further, I want to make clear that none of things are sin or disobedience for others that don't do them.  But these are things that the Lord has been asking me to do for a long time and I have literally disobeyed along with back-talked with every excuse in the book.  So this has been my journey and in no way am I saying that this is everyone's journey.

And that's the deal, if the Lord is asking you to...nudging you often...and you don't, then it's disobedience.  What it has looked like is a ton of anxiety for me.  It has also meant constant frustration. 

• I weighed more than I wanted to even though I wasn't eating terrible and working out
• everytime that I would go in my room to unmade bed, I was anxious about how messy the room looked (yet still didn't make the bed)
• I would leave things out and then they would be out of their proper place forever which would lead to a messy house...which made me angry and anxious
• I had all these cute clothes that I hadn't worn...1) I wasn't a fan of how they looked on me 2) I would sleep in, not shower, etc and stay in the clothes I worked out in.  This caused anxiety and frustration. 
• I wasn't getting any good quiet time in because I was waiting til after the girls were up...so when I would try to have it when they were awake and they interrupted me, I would get upset with them

Do you see disobedience written all over this?  I was lazy, undisciplined and not a blessing to anyone around me.  It was not a good place to be.

So slowly, through reasonable discipline, the Lord has led me out of this.  He has given me tools to combat the laziness and given me new desire for obedience and faithfulness in the small things. 

One thing that has come up as I have talked to people about this, is the faithfulness in the small things piece.  Why would the Lord trust me with big, important, Kingdom things if I can't be faithful to the small things that He is asking of me? 

Hebrews 10: 10, 11

10 They disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness. 11 No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.

I want to share in His holiness and see harvest.  I want to experience peace. 

So I continue to ask each day and He continues to speak.  I try to listen and be obedient to the things He is asking of me.  And honestly, He has added some new things to the list.  He has added bigger things.  And I believe that there is preparation in this faithfulness.  I believe that He wants to bestow blessings of His kingdom and revelations of Himself in my obedience. 

And I am thankful for His discipline.

I could say a thousand more things about this, but right now I'm being faithful to walk a few things out every day in discipline with joy.  And the blessing of knowing Him more and being nearer to Him is huge!