Obedience

John 14:15 “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.”

My attention was brought to his particular verse on one of the first dates my now husband and I went on. We were coming back from a local Christian music festival, and although we went to the same church and had the same group of friends, we were still trying to get to know one another. I remember him asking me my favorite bible verse, and I replied Hebrews 12:1, which I used to pride myself on being able to quote, verbatim, from the KJV. Of course in this moment I was unable to quote it and felt slightly embarrassed, because how can a good Christian girl forget her favorite bible verse?! This led to me asking him his favorite verse, to which he replied, John 14:15, and then explained that this particular verse had been convicting him because we can easily fall so short of this command.

Over the last year and some odd months, this verse has continued to pop up, and the Lord has continually reminded me of it, and its importance. It is a verse that, if I’m being completely honest, intimidates me a little bit. I am a sinner and I do not always follow the Lord’s commands. However, through reading and digging deeper into HIs word, this verse has become less intimidating and is helping me to grow in my walk with the Lord.

It’s a simple enough verse, but there is so much to learn from digging a little deeper into it. I love looking up the Greek and Hebrew translation of the bible, because there is so much to learn from the original text. For instance, in this verse, keep is translated to tereo. The definition of tereo is “to attend to carefully, take care of; to guard; to keep, one in the state in which he is; to observe; to reserve: undergo something.” According to this definition, if we love Jesus we are not to just follow His commands, we are to take care of them, to guard them, to observe them. How beautiful is that? This gives me an entirely new way to view this verse. Following His commands does not just mean we will follow rules, but it means that we will cherish the commands that draw us closer to Him. We will guard them and hold them dear to our hearts, as we strive to become more like Jesus.

My prayer is that I will love the Lord, truly love Him, more and more each day and love His commandments. My prayer is that when I say I love the Lord, there is evidence, through my obedience to Him, that this is true. And this is my prayer for you too.

If we follow the commands that the Lord gives us begrudgingly, we are not truly loving the Lord. We are simply filling an obligation at that point. And that is a trap that I fall into sometimes. It’s only when we understand, guard, and cherish His commands, that we can have a sincere love for the Lord.

I have tried so hard, admittedly sometimes in my own strength, to love the Lord in this way. And let me tell you, it has not been easy. I have actually been wanting to write about this particular piece of scripture, and its importance in the life of every disciple of Christ, but each time I started, it felt forced and not genuine. I think the reason why I have been unable to write about it until this point, is because I didn’t fully understand it. And honestly, we will never fully understand all of the Bible, but I can confidently say that the more I seek the Lord, the more He will reveal to me!