Good Afternoon Devotion :-)❤️

God Smiles When We Obey Wholeheartedly
By Rick Warren

“Just tell me what to do and I will do it, Lord. As long as I live I’ll wholeheartedly obey” (Psalm 119:33-34 TLB).

God smiles when we obey him wholeheartedly. That means doing whatever God asks without reservation or hesitation. You don’t procrastinate and say, “I’ll pray about it.” You do it without delay. Every parent knows that delayed obedience is really disobedience.

God doesn’t owe you an explanation or reason for everything he asks you to do. Understanding can wait, but obedience can’t. Instant obedience will teach you more about God than a lifetime of Bible discussions. In fact, you will never understand some commands until you obey them first. Obedience unlocks understanding.

Often we try to offer God partial obedience. We want to pick and choose the commands we obey. We make a list of the commands we like and then obey those while ignoring the ones we think are unreasonable, difficult, expensive, or unpopular. “I’ll attend church, but I won’t tithe.” “I’ll read my Bible, but I won’t forgive the person who hurt me.” Yet partial obedience is disobedience.

Wholehearted obedience is done joyfully, with enthusiasm. The Bible says, “Obey him gladly” (Psalm 100:2 TLB).

This is the attitude of David: “Just tell me what to do and I will do it, Lord. As long as I live I’ll wholeheartedly obey” (Psalm 119:33-34 TLB).

James, writing to Christians, says God is pleased not only by what we believe, but also by what we do (see James 2:24).

God’s Word is clear that you can’t earn your salvation. It comes only by grace, not your effort. But as a child of God you can bring pleasure to your heavenly Father through obedience. Any act of obedience is also an act of worship.

Why is obedience pleasing to God? Because it demonstrates that you really love him. Jesus said, “If you love me, you will obey my commandments” (John 14:15 GNT).

Reflections:

Why do you think God doesn’t explain some commands until after we are obedient to follow them?

Think about the last time you exercised instant obedience to God. What did that choice reveal about your faith?

Why do we sometimes offer God a partial obedience? Why have you tried to bargain with God in the past?

Good afternoon, my dear steemit family.❤️ Today's devotion is a very timely reminder and note to myself. I do choose some of the Lord's commandments to obey and sometimes, I get to procrastinate the urgent ones (like forgiving the people who have hurt me, caused me so much pain and really aggravated my patience in the past). For me, forgiveness is really my personal struggle, it's so hard for me to forgive those people. But I have been praying for God to be merciful and gracious to me so that I can fully and wholeheartedly obey His command & that is for me to fully and wholeheartedly forgive those people who have wronged me and my family, 100% not 50%, 75% or 99.99%, but it should be 100%. It is actually not hard, it is very impossible for me, but I can only release these people in my life and forgive them fully with all my heart, only by God's grace.

I am again reminded to fully forgive them and just let go and move on. The process is long and indeed painful, but by God's amazing grace, I can come out better and not bitter. If we want to be happy and completely at peace, let us make sure to obey our good God wholeheartedly. Let us make sure that God is smiling at us :-) everyday. ❤️

Thank you for your time in reading my post today. I hope and pray that you're blessed and it's worth your time. I praise and thank God for my friend's generosity and consistency in sharing her devotion with me. She is such a good soul and may the Lord bless her more. :-)❤️

God bless each and everyone. :-)

I am @sashley a.k.a. shirleynpenalosa, a recipient of God's love, mercy and grace. ❤️

Have a blessed L❤️ve Month 2018 everyone :-)❤️

I am forever grateful to God every day of my life for giving me everything that I need and praise Him all the more for not giving me everything I want. To God be all the honor, praise and glory ❤️ :-)

@surpassinggoogle is such a generous person and has a very big heart for all of us here. Please support him as a witness by voting him at https://steemit.com/~witnesses and type in "steemgigs" at the first search box.

(Photo credits: from sir @surpassinggoogle's post footer)

If you want to give him witness voting decisions on your behalf, visit https://steemit.com/~witnesses again and type in "surpassinggoogle" in the second box as a proxy.

@paradise-found is a wonderful person, a very humble and generous encourager, let us also support him by voting and typing in "gratefulvibes" at the search box

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Other good witnesses to recommend:

@yabapmatt
@teamsteem
@bayanihan
@jerrybanfield
@hr1
@acidyo
@blocktrades
@curie
@cloh76.witness
@rcarter.witness
@reggaemuffin
@arcange

They need our support

(Source: from my friend's devotional materials authored by Rick Warren)