God Expects Us To Honor Our Obedience To Him
Word-Of-The-Day: ‘(2) Blessed are those who keep His statutes and seek Him with all their heart – (3) they do no wrong but follow His ways. (4) You have laid down precepts that are to be fully obeyed. (5) Oh, that my ways were steadfast in obeying Your decrees! (6) Then I would not be put to shame when I consider all Your commands.’ (Psalm 119:2-6)
Psalm 119 is the longest Psalm and longest chapter in the Bible with 176 verses. The Psalm in the original Hebrew is ‘acrostic’, with 22 sections; each section starting with a letter in the Hebrew alphabet (in alphabetical order). The beginning of Psalm 119 which is referenced today tells us that God expects our obedience when it comes to His word; it is not shameful or wrong to honor or work on behalf of the Lord.
In today’s society, some make honoring the Lord or proudly proclaiming Him to others as wrong or unlawful. A couple episodes in recent memory come up. Congress has been questioning in the last several days why the FBI believes ‘traditional Catholics’, or those who go to Latin Mass, were described in a memo as ‘radical’ and needed to be considered ‘domestic terrorists’. Another one earlier this year was at the ‘Mall of America’ in Minneapolis, Minnesota, as the mall cops decided to detain and attempt to trespass a young man that was dressed with a shirt emblazoned with they saw as an ‘obscene slogan’, that slogan being ‘Jesus Saves’ on the front and ‘Jesus is the Only Way’ on the back.
For the Catholics, they are being steadfast in their worship of the Lord; what actions could be taken as radical or terroristic in taking part in a traditional worship service lasting for over a thousand years seems miniscule at best. The young man (who was found to be a devout follower of Christ) wearing a ‘Jesus Saves’ shirt is keeping in line with what the unknown Psalmist is saying in these verses; he has both actively (preaching the Word of the Lord) and passively (wearing his Jesus Saves shirt) obeyed the Lord’s instructions of the Great Commission (Matthew 28:16-20) and is not ashamed of the Lord, and is willing to stand up for the Gospel of Jesus (Mark 8:34-38).
The secular world finds Jesus offensive, as did the Pharisees, who put Him upon the cross for being offensive to them. It should not surprise us that those who embark on lies will find us who are in Christ and live for Him to be offensive as well. The question becomes how will we react when (not if) we are confronted by those who find us offensive? The examples we have are of two disciples of Jesus; Stephen and Peter.
Stephen, in Acts 6:5-7:60, stands up for the Gospel of Jesus, and when confronted does not back away or conform to the Sanhedrin but instead ‘doubles down’ and provides for them the Gospel truth that Jesus is the Messiah and is God Manifested. Faced with death, Stephen continued to extol Jesus, even when being stoned to death. The Apostle Peter, earlier in Acts 3:11-4:22, stood up to the ruling class of Israel and proclaimed the Gospel of Jesus; with the Apostle John they stood together in front of the same Sanhedrin holding fast the Truth of Jesus. In their case, they were released due to their ‘audaciousness’ of speaking so Spiritually despite being ‘common folk’.
We need to be as audacious as Peter and John, as open as the young man, and as faithful and devoted to worshipping as the Latin Mass Catholics. Do not back down from the Truth; hold fast to what is right and proper, and in a world that expects other to cower, do not waver or compromise the Gospel of Christ. Hold fast, support your fellow Christians, and never fear – Jesus is always near!
