Obedience to God

[Greg J.]

... I struggle comprehending verses such as 1 John 5:3-4, which state that the true children of God obey his commandments. The only problem with this is that I struggle with sin everyday and I most definitely am not a doer of great works.

Verse 3 actually implies that we need to struggle to obey. Perhaps you are thinking of verse 18 or 1 John 3:9.

Consider who you are now that you are born again in Christ. God did not give you a spiritual rebirth into a creature tainted with sin. We are new creations, not old. However, we are commanded to live as we really are and not like who we were. John's statement is both of who we really are, rather than how we act (something true in heaven, but still being worked out on earth) as well as how he sees Christians when he has been sanctified so much that his earthly form is much like his heavenly form. He was more easily able to see Christians as the spiritual beings that we are, rather than what we appear to be (the "old man").

(He recognizes both in 1 John: that we cannot sin and that we do sin.)

I also don't understand the meaning of faith without works is dead (James 2:14-17).

In this passage James is defining two kinds of faith. One he calls faith (faith that saves) and the other, dead faith (faith that doesn't save). Without reading each verse with that in mind, verse 24 will be misinterpreted.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

"To obey God?"
Every day seek HIM, consciously, thoughtfully, in every activity and thought and dream and hope and desire and action (yes, in everything).

Nothing is "secular" for someone immersed in Y'SHUA - abiding in HIM is 24/7/365/eternity i.e. ALL THE TIME, EVERY MOMENT, FOREVER.

This is much different than joining a fitness club, even more than going for workouts 3 hours every day.

Living and abiding in Y'SHUA is ALL DAY, EVERY DAY, FOREVER.
(and it is often the opposite of religious groups)

What does it mean to obey God? Is it possible to keep God's commandments?

 

[Soyeong]

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,

I always use Romans 3:28 to assert my belief that no Christian can or ever will be justified before God by the works of the law (good works, etc.). Although I truly believe I am saved by the blood of Christ and not by works (lest any man should boast: Ephesians 2:9), I struggle comprehending verses such as 1 John 5:3-4, which state that the true children of God obey his commandments. The only problem with this is that I struggle with sin everyday and I most definitely am not a doer of great works. I also don't understand the meaning of faith without works is dead (James 2:14-17). What does it mean to obey God? Is it possible to keep God's commandments? Is it good enough to just believe in Christ and just believing will save me? Or am I saved by faith and obedience?

Peace be with you,

BB

According to Romans 4:1-8, Abraham and David were justified by faith, and the one and only way to become justified has only ever been by faith, so Moses was justified by faith apart from the law before it was given to him, which means that the law was never given nor needed for that purpose. Paul spent a lot of time making that point that obeying the law was not about trying to become justified and that we are justified by faith apart from the law, yet today many people still think obeying the law is about trying to become justified, only they have compounded their error by concluding that therefore we don't need to obey the law, whereas Paul concluded a few verses later in Romans 3:31 that our faith does not abolish the law, but rather our faith upholds the law. God told the Israelites that what He commanded was for their own good (Deuteronomy 6:24, Deuteronomy 10:13), so the people who believed what God said were demonstrating their faith in God about how they should live by living in obedience to His commands, for the righteous shall live by faith (Habakkuk 2:4). In Romans 2:13, Paul said that it is not the hearers of the law that will be justified, but the doers, however, we are not justified by doing the law, but by having a faith that causes us to be a doer of the law, and in that way our faith upholds the law. Faith without works is death because we can't say that we trust God about how we should live while at the same time refusing to follow His commands for how we should live. We all struggle with the temptation to sin and need to repent by faith when we falter, but we are going through the process of sanctification of being made to be more like Christ in doing what is holy, righteous, and good, and we can have faith that he who began a good work in us will be faithful to complete it on the day of the Lord (Philippians 1:6).

I think part of what clears us the confusions is realizing that the Bible speaks about our salvation in the past, present, and future tense (Ephesians 2:5, Philippians 2:12, Romans 5:9-10), so our salvation is all encompassing, where we have been saved from the penalty of our sins, we are being saved from continuing to sin, and we will be saved from God's wrath on the day of the Lord. Our salvation is from sin (Matthew 1:21) and sin is defined as lawlessness (1 John 3:4), so our salvation necessarily involves being trained to stop being lawless for the purpose of becoming obedient to the law. According to Titus 2:11-14, our salvation involves being saved from the penalty of our sins by Christ giving himself to redeem us from all lawlessness, but it also involves being saved from continuing to sin by God's grace training us to do what God has revealed be godly, righteous, and good, and training us to renounce doing what is ungodly and sinful, which is essentially what God's law instructs us to do. According to Ephesians 2:8-10, we have been saved in the past tense by grace through faith, not by doing good works, but for the purpose of doing good works by grace through faith in the present tense. In other words, we are not to do good works in order to become saved, but because we have been, are being, and will be saved from sin.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

In other words, we are not to do good works in order to become saved, but because we have been and are being saved from sin.

AMEIN HALLELUYAH !

OP et al (and others) DO YOU KNOW
any
place where believers are TAUGHT and TRAINED TO DO what YHWH SAYS ?
(the "good works" that HE INSTRUCTS US TO DO)
TO be DOers of HIS WORD, and
NOT just HEARers only ?

I know of ALMOST NO PLACE, where this truth is being actively taught.
(IT MIGHT BE "passively" taught, as it is IN SCRIPTURE,
and may be in THE LIBRARY SOMEPLACE -
but people then have to FIND OUT ON THEIR OWN, from YHWH/ HIS guidance/ HIS WORD....)

In fact and in experience, A LOT (probably MOST) of places
REFUSE.

 

[Soyeong]

Thank you very much for your response. I have one last question: What happens to unobedient believers? In Matthew 13:30, there is an emphasis on burning the weeds. Could an unobedient believer in Christ be a part of the weeds? To me it seems like an obvious no, but I still seek to know how to be obedient to God. Is it even possible to obey God?

Our goal is perfect obedience, but we will fail to obtain that goal until he who began a good work in us is faithful to complete it on the day of Christ Jesus and we are made to be like him in being perfectly obedient. So the issue is not about whether you are perfectly obedient now, but about whether you continue to practice repentance when you do sin, and if you do so, then you will not be part of the weeds because God is faithful and just and will redeem us from all unrighteousness. It is certainly possible to obey God and if you have not murdered anyone today, then have obeyed Him. In Deuteronomy 30:11-14, God said that what He commanded was not too difficult for us and in 1 John 5:3, it confirms that the commands of God are not burdensome.

Now are the believers with unfeigned love cast into the fire? What if they can never come to love their brother, but seek repentance and grace until their death bed?

Christianity is just as much about getting heaven into us as it is about getting us into heaven, so if someone plans to repent later, then they are really missing the whole point of repentance. It is about recognizing that God's ways are higher than our ways and turning from our ways and from disobedience back to God's ways and obedience. It is not about thinking that we know better than God how we should live, disregarding His commands, and taking out a fire insurance policy right before we kick the bucket. While I think deathbed conversions can be genuine, I find myself highly skeptical of them, though only God knows their hearts.