Believe and Obey1

This coming weekend marks the culmination of the Believe Project with a goal of taking in over one million dollars in a single weekend.

My wife and I have been praying about what we should give, and, honestly, I’ve wrestled with God about this.  When we first started giving to the Believe Project over a year ago, our options for giving fell quite neatly into three categories:

A.  the Comfortable amount – what we would safely give without altering out lifestyle
B.  the Possible amount – what we could give if we sacrificed and slashed our budget
C.  the Unbelievable amount – what we wanted to give but couldn’t dream of putting our hands on this much money… (our impossible amount was over twice the size of our possible amount)

That was early in 2009.  Here we are over a year later, and my wife and I plan to complete our “possible amount” donation on Saturday.  We rejoice in that answer to prayer for God’s provision… But, the Lord wasn’t finished.  As we’ve prepared to complete our pledge (the possible amount), it was as if the Lord whispered… “Do you remember the Unbelievable amount?  I want that too.”

I didn’t hear God speak in an audible voice. Yet, every time we prayed/planned/thought about what we would give to the Believe Project, the Lord reminded me of the unbelievable amount that I thought was impossible for my family to give.  I think that God made me vividly remember the amount that I claimed was “unbelievable,” so that I would grow in my belief after having witnessed God do the impossible in my life.

Immediately, though, insecurity set in.  My initial reaction was to come up with excuses for not pledging the full amount.  Can we really obey God in that?  Not to mention that my wife and I had been saving for significant upcoming expenses… But, God was faithfully breaking our hearts for the spread of the gospel.

Lately, I’ve been reading Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Discipleship. The first section of the book explores the severity and sobriety of following Christ.  Bonhoeffer’s words pierce through an easy, nominal Christianity, calling all Christians to truly understand what Jesus meant by stating…

If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.  For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his soul? (Mark 8:34-36)

In many churches today, we profess Christ with our mouths, but our actions are divorced from our beliefs.  Bonhoeffer combats such a mindset by proposing that “Only the believers obey, and only the obedient believe.”  Concurrently, “Faith is only faith in deeds of obedience.”  There’s a vital relationship between what we believe and what we do.

After encountering Bonhoeffer’s challenge, I stopped to repent of my unbelief.  I said I believed… but I hesitated at the opportunity to joyfully obey my Heavenly Father.  After all, if we truly believe that God is everything He claims to be, then why wouldn’t we want to follow Him with a simple, child-like obedience?  As we head into a milestone weekend for the life of our church, let’s believe God together and follow Him faithfully in obedience!