"God has lots of children in the church today; I'm honestly not sure He has many friends."
So said Mike Pilavachi at last weekend's Worship Central conference. I haven't been able to get the quote out of my head ever since.
Mike was talking about how we can be more intimate with God. He commented that God wants His church to grow up – not to stop being His children, but to be His friends too.
Exploring the concept of friendship, Mike said that while he's heard of "the five love languages" God has a sixth: obedience.
I have been pondering this subject for a while myself. As God's people, what is it that sets us apart, which shows we belong to Him? Surely obedience to Him is a key indicator of that?
God never stands over us beating us into submission, and yet Jesus said that if we love Him we will obey His commands (John 14:15). The ultimate expression of love is doing things that we know will please the other person – and that basically boils down to obedience.
We can see that at work in the relationship Jesus describes in John 15, where He says that He loves because His Father has loved Him, and that He remains in God's love by keeping His commands. He urges us to do the same, in order to enjoy that relationship of love and joy for ourselves too:
"If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commands and remain in his love.
"I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete." (vv10–11)
John expresses the same sentiment in 1 John 5:3: "In fact, this is love for God: to keep his commands. And his commands are not burdensome..."
So why do we find the whole idea of obedience difficult? Well, as Mike pointed out, as a society we don't like to be told what to do; our culture is a very individualistic one in which I am in control of my destiny.
Obedience to God means taking our hands off of the control panels of our lives and submitting our own ideas about our lives to His. That's an almost alien concept to begin with.
It doesn't get any easier at times either! Quite often, when I feel I've made real progress and am used to checking in with God whenever I'm making decisions, if my ideas differ to His then I'm faced with the dilemma of whether or not to let go of the control all over again.
The whole concept of friendship and obedience going hand in hand can seem like an odd one to us too. Friendships are usually born out of mutual respect and equality and so to obey a friend could seem like we are belittling ourselves.
But of course God is not like any other friend. And we could never be on an equal footing to Him anyway – and we certainly shouldn't try to be. It is incredible that Jesus said to His disciples:
"I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you." (John 15:15)
And, through Jesus' ultimate sacrifice on the cross, we are now able to call God not just friend but Father: "The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs – heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory." (Romans 8:16–17)
That is quite mind-blowing – we are not only children but co-heirs with Jesus. Everything He inherits we do too! But it is interesting that this verse talks about sharing in the suffering as well as the good things...
That's part of what I believe Mike was talking about when he said he thinks God wants the church to grow up. Like little children we can look to Him for presents; to feel good and enjoy all the benefits of being a Christian but we can be guilty of demanding things on our own terms and sulking when we don't get our own way.
Loving God as our friend means we need to respect Him and acknowledge that He actually knows better than we do what is best for us. If He asks us to walk a hard path there will be a reason for it; one day we will see the stunning finished tapestry of His wisdom as He has woven it out throughout the ages but, for now, we simply need to learn to trust Him.
Learning to obey is pretty tough – especially in those areas that we think we are doing pretty well running them for ourselves. But if we look into our hearts honestly and see that we have an issue with obedience, can we really call ourselves God's friends?
If obedience is the ultimate expression of love, shouldn't we spend a little more time trying to cultivate it? I can't imagine God is going to watch from the sidelines without helping us at all – He is so full of grace I believe He takes a huge stride towards us whenever we take that first tentative step.
God longs to be in closer communion with His friends – but that kind of intimacy only comes through obedience. Is there an area of your life or a part of your character that He's already been talking to you about that you know you need to obey Him in? Consider your friendship, and take some action today.
