Challenging Commandments For Greater Glory
One of the things I love the most about our Lord Jesus is the fact that He calls and challenges us, encouraging and sometimes literally commanding us to have a high standard of life. Our Lord cares about excellence and growth in love, patience, knowledge…everything.
In a world where it’s easy to identify people of faith and mock Christians, God is not only defending and protecting His children who desire to follow Him, but He is also motivating us to do more and to become better, to finish the race, and finish it well, exactly as a good trainer would do with his beloved sports team.
Sometimes and maybe most of all in His sermon at the mountain, Jesus’ words sounded something along the lines of “Do you really think that you are good enough? Different enough? Blessed? I really want you to be perfect, so I’m going to give you impossible standards that can only be achieved with God”.
It sounds crazy. It sounds cruel but it depends on how we understand the words of our Lord Jesus. While human eyes may see unreasonable commandments, those who love Jesus Christ see His love. God wants His Kingdom to expand and be strong, and this is not always easy or automatic. We really need to give the Lord our everything. This includes our mind, heart, strength and body—as we love the one who gave us everything and can change the world inside and outside of us. This transformation is possible for the Lord but impossible for us to achieve by ourselves. We must allow the Lord to do His work in us.
You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire. (Matthew 5.21-22, ESV)
The way Jesus challenges us as His people is not ordinary. It’s not worldly. He is not encouraging our flesh (as a sports trainer would do), neither is He asking us to bring more fruits without the deep change of our heart and the attitude that develops as we abide in Him and His love. He is not giving impossible orders as a wicked master, but He is giving us everything we need to accomplish the task. Strategies, resources, ways, people and most of all He gave us Himself, opening the door of Heaven to us. God is offering us a free relationship with Him and He is showing the only way for a truly successful life. We truly serve an amazing God! What a perfect God of perfect gifts!
Jesus would like to sanctify us in a perfect way as He revealed to us in the book of Leviticus. His desire is that the seed becomes a huge tree that welcomes many birds (Luke 13:18-19, ESV) and that “the [whole] earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.” Habakkuk 2:14, ESV. If you ever wonder if your dreams and plans are too high, well… our Father has bigger ones.
Our God is not a normal, boring, or ordinary God. He would like to do major things. Starting from the small, the humble, the weak but always bringing it to the great, the glorious, and the victorious. We can dare to dream and dream big with Him, we can dare to ask Him great things, and we can dare to ask for miracles in order to give Him the glory.
One of the most challenging and beautiful commands is “love your enemies”. Who would think of such a thing? It’s radical and absurd, but our Lord commanded His disciples without doubt or shame, and also provided evidence that we can do it, showing us a perfect example in Himself.
I cherish this command because every time I start praying for my enemies I come to realize something very deep—that the problem is in my heart, in my thoughts, in my eyes and not just the existence or the behaviours of my enemies. I reflect on this a lot because praying for my enemies is like a mirror that reveals my own inadequacies and not just that of others. As much as I desire a change in the world around me, I need that change as well. I have a sinful nature and I need to ask God to give me a new heart, new patience, and a new attitude towards others. It’s not pleasant when the Holy Spirit exposes our sins to us, but here is something revolutionary: we thank God for everything, and guess what? ‘In everything’ means sins are included too!
We can thank God for every sin because without them, we wouldn’t receive mercy, learn forgiveness and experience His goodness. Every sin is an opportunity for God to love us, change us, and every shortcoming is more ground for us to submit to him and be conformed to His image. Of course, we don’t want to live a life of sin (Romans 6:1, ESV) neither do we want to spend lots of time identifying sin in us so we can feel closer to God. But for sure, we can live rejoicing all the time, we can live free because we trust Him and we can be thankful for His willingness to help us, protect us, cover us, and wait for us.
Soon I’ll leave for a year and I’ll dedicate all the time God gave me for His will. Following another difficult command, I’ll bring the Gospel to a land where access to the Gospel is very much limited—as it’s a 99% Muslim country. In the process of the preparation, I’m asking God many questions and I’m learning that He doesn’t want to put us in danger, rather, He knows perfectly what is good for us. It’s good to leave without anything as He orders His disciples (Luke 10) and talk about His good news. This causes my faith to grow, but also makes me ask myself “Do I know how to speak about Jesus?”, “Do I have enough love for a mission like this?”, “Am I the right person to do this?”. I always come to the conclusion that I can’t do anything with my own strength. Even the desire to do something major doesn’t come from me. God loves me so much that He puts in my heart His dreams, and His love leads and compels me to go on this mission (2 Corinthians 5:14-15, ESV).
My desire is to encourage my brothers and sisters who will read this article that we should not be afraid to follow Jesus and put into practice what He is calling us to do. I may have some fears, but I’m learning that God is bigger than anything, as He often says to us. He is bigger than our past experiences that created fears and scars. He is greater than any doubt, question, mountain, problem, and even His commands written in the Scripture. He is able and with Him, ONLY with Him, all things are possible.
Be encouraged! We truly are more than conquerors and can live a victorious life that the human mind can’t grasp or understand, and the victory is this: our faith.
For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world – our faith. (1 John 5:4, ESV)
