Preface: These addresses on Obedience are issued with the very fervent prayer that it may please our gracious Father to use them for the instruction and strengthening of the young men and women, on whose obedience and devotion so much depends for the Church and the world. To all of them who read this I send my loving greeting. The God of all grace bless them abundantly!
It often happens after a Conference, or even after writing a book, that it is as if one only then begins to see the meaning and importance of the truth with which one has been occupied. So I do indeed feel as if I had utterly failed in grasping or expounding the spiritual character, the altogether indispensable necessity, the divine and actual possibility, the inconceivable blessedness of a life of true and entire obedience to our Father in heaven. Let me, therefore, just in a few sentences gather up the main points which have come home to myself with special power, and ask every reader at starting to take note of them as SOME OF THE CHIEF LESSONS to be learnt in Christ’s school of obedience.
The Father in heaven asks, and requires, and actually expects, that every child of His yield Him whole-hearted and entire obedience, day by day, and all the day.
To enable His child to do this, He has made a most abundant and altogether sufficient provision in the promise of the New Covenant, and in the gift of His Son and Spirit.
This provision can alone, but can most certainly, be enjoyed, and these promises fulfilled, in the soul that gives itself up to a life in the abiding communion with the Three-in-One God, so that His presence and power work in it all the day.
The very entrance into this life demands the vow of absolute obedience, or the surrender of the whole being, to be, think, speak, do, every moment, nothing but what is according to the will of God, and well-pleasing to Him.
If these things be indeed true, it is not enough to assent to them: we need the Holy Spirit to give us such a vision of their glory and divine power, and the demand they make on our immediate and unconditional submission, that there may be no rest till we accept all that God is willing to do for us.
Let us all pray that God may, by the light of His Spirit, so show His loving and almighty will concerning us, that it may be impossible for us to be disobedient to the heavenly vision. ~Andrew Murray
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Andrew Murray (1828 - 1917) was a missionary, statesman, educator, revivalist, evangelist, and pastor during the nineteenth century. He is one of the best loved and most widely read writers on the deeper Christian life.
It was a choice of logic to become a minister, but during the course of his studies, he met the God of the Bible and came to know Him more intimately than most. The theme of his life was, “May not a single moment of my life be spent outside the light, love, and joy of God's presence, and not a moment without the entire surrender of myself as a vessel for him to fill full of his Spirit and his love.”
His personal knowledge and insight of God’s inward grace was evident in all his writings. With his extraordinary skill at putting his spiritual insight into the written word, it is no surprise that he was used mightily by God in his lifetime, with the effects of his literature still having far-reaching results in the hearts and lives of Christians today.
