relationships and obedience

I had an interesting teaching moment this past Sunday during our morning youth Bible study that I've gone back and thought about several times since... and I think it's worth sharing.

We were studying the first chapter of the book of Daniel in the Old Testament. In it, Daniel and his three friends (Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego) make the tough decision to refuse the king's food and instead restrict themselves to a diet of only vegetables and water. Whether the problem with the food was an issue of Jewish dietary restrictions or whether it had been a part of idol worship or whatever, Daniel felt that eating it would have a negative affect on his relationship with God. Obviously the easy thing would have been to keep quiet and eat what everyone else was eating. The hard thing was going against the flow in order to honor God.

And so comes the question: Why? Why would we ever choose the hard task of obeying God when it's more desirable and/or easier to go the way of the rest of humanity?

Before I get to the payoff, you should know that earlier in the morning we played a game in which three of our students tried to get as many followers as they could. Each one had the task of convincing the other youth to do what they told them to do (and not what the other two potential leaders were trying to tell them to do). One of the leaders, Kandice, was getting people to hold hands and was successful in getting two guys who were sitting next to one another to follow her instructions and hold hands (and, being a guy, I know this is certainly not something we normally want to do).

So, when I asked the question, why would we want to obey God when it's hard and inconvenient, this illustration hit me. I asked Tyler (one of the boys who agreed to hold hands with another boy), "Why would you do something that you obviously wouldn't normally want to do?" He said, "I don't know... it's Kandice."

Exactly. It's because of his relationship with her that he was willing to do it. He may not have agreed to do it for most anybody else (including me), but, for her, no problem. It didn't matter that it made him uncomfortable or that she didn't give him a great reason for agreeing to it; he knew and trusted the person who asked him. In fact, if he didn't do it, he knew there was the potential to hurt her feelings... and, as a result, the quality of their friendship.

I tried to explain to the teenagers that this is the exact (and only real) reason for obeying Jesus... out of a relationship with him. So, when Jesus asks me to do something hard or uncomfortable, why should I do it? Because it's Jesus... and I love Jesus. Which, by the way, if this is true, it should never be surprising when someone who is not a Christian, doesn't act like a Christian and doesn't obey Jesus' words. They don't have a relationship with Jesus and have no reason to listen to him. But, on the other hand, if we claim to have a love relationship with Jesus, when we choose to disobey him, we should really be concerned about what that implies about the quality of our relationship. Or as Jesus puts it, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching... he who does not love me will not obey my teaching" (John 14:23-24). Or as John says, "If we claim to have fellowship with [Jesus] yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth" (1 John 1:6).

So, going back to the book of Daniel, one of the things we know about Daniel was that he had a strong relationship with God. If you know the story of the Lion's Den, then you know he was punished precisely because he was more willing to sacrifice his life than he was willing to sacrifice his relationship with God through prayer. Daniel was able to make the tough decisions and obey faithfully because he had a relationship and thoroughly trusted the One who asked him to follow.

The life of adolescence is filled with tough decisions... and "small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it" (Matthew 7:14).