You are saved. You got saved a while back. So what? Then what?
Once you are sure of your faith the next step is to deal with growth.
Are you growing in your faith in your walk with the Lord?
Your overall Spiritual Disciplines health is a good measure
Here let us break down Spiritual Disciplines into two parts:
- Internal spiritual disciplines – Those that have to do with yourself. Your knowledge of God. Your understanding of God. Your being transformed into the image of His Son Jesus Christ.
✅Solitude
✅Prayer and Fasting
✅Bible Study and Meditation
2. External spiritual disciplines – Heavily intertwined with the internal spiritual disciplines. The are a result of the first. They are easily shown or portrayed as you relate with others. They include the gifts of the Spirit and the fruit of the Spirit. It also includes sharing of your faith in obedience to Matthew 28:19-20
✅Fellowshipping with others
✅Sharing of Faith
✅Fruits of the Spirit
✅Gifts of the Spirit
There is one spiritual discipline that in my observation ties all of them together. I call it the discipline of OBEDIENCE
In the Old Testament we find this in 1 Samuel 15:22-23
But Samuel replied
“Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices
as much as in obeying the Lord?
To obey is better than sacrifice,
and to heed is better than the fat of rams.
For rebellion is like the sin of divination,
and arrogance like the evil of idolatry.
Because you have rejected the word of the Lord,
he has rejected you as king.”
Here we observe that the opposite of Obedience is not disobedience but Rebellion
The context is Saul’s outright rebellion against God when given simple instructions to completely destroy the Amalekites. Not only does he not destroy them he has the audacity of carrying flock from their city and bringing it as a sacrifice to God. Such disrespect! And then he goes ahead and decides to conduct the sacrifice claiming Prophet Samuel is taking too long. Woi, his judgement was clear and decisive: Because you have rejected the Word of the Lord, He has rejected you as king Boom!
We are clearly told here that as far as God is concerned obedience supersedes everything. Including Sacrifice. If you take a moment to reflect, we would rather chose sacrifice than obedience It is easier to give God our money, our bodies, everything but so hard to OBEY His Word when He says love your neighbor. Love the Lord with all of you. Everything outside of you but not YOU
In the New Testament the Jesus explicitly talks about Obedience in John 14:15
If you love me, keep (obey) my commandments
The Apostle of love in 1 John 5:3 reiterates this:
In fact, this is love for God: to keep (obey) his commands. And his commands are not burdensome,
To love God is to OBEY His commands. His Word – Genesis to Revelation – is His commands. That is why we must Study it. Learn it. Meditate upon it. Memorize it. Then OBEY it. And the other spiritual disciplines all helps us in this pursuit of OBEDIENCE – Prayer. Fasting. Solitude. Silence.
Jesus Christ is the perfect example of OBEDIENCE We are told about this in Philippians 2:1-11. In vs.8
. . . He became obedient unto death, even death on a cross
Jesus OBEYED the Father in Everything.
After we speak the confirmation of our faith then we must continue to grow in this faith through spiritual disciplines And OBEDIENCE is at the core of it all.
Reflection – Are you walking in OBEDIENCE to God?
