This is love for God: to keep his commands. And his commands are not burdensome. (1 John 5:3)
When you read today’s verse, do you wonder why John was inspired to add, “And his commands are not burdensome”? We can all remember times–probably lots of times–when it seemed like keeping God’s commands was an incredible burden . . . perhaps an impossible burden! Forgiving someone who has wronged us . . . Loving someone who is unlovable . . . Serving someone who is never satisfied . . . All of these are very difficult things to do, even on our best days. Of course, the answer to this dilemma is found on the front end of the verse, where John tells us that love for God equals obedience to God. When we keep our focus on our love for God, obedience to God is not burdensome. In fact, this is how we move from obedience feeling like an onerous duty to being a Spirit-filled delight.
In the parable of the prodigal son, we see just how odious obedience had become to the elder brother. When his younger brother, the prodigal, returned home after squandering his inheritance and was welcomed by their father with open arms, the elder brother growled at his father, “Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders” (Luke 15:29). Do you see it? He believed that he had been perfect in his obedience to his father, but his obedience was not a delight; it was a duty that had obviously descended into drudgery. He was not obeying his father out of love; he was obeying out of self-love and what he hoped to get from his father.
How is it with you? Is your obedience a delight? Have you found the path of righteousness and holy living to be not burdensome? Are you able to say from your heart, “I delight to do your will, O my God” (Psalm 40:8)? Only to the extent that your heart beats for Jesus will your answers to these questions be a resounding “YES!” Our Lord provided us with the most magnificent model of obedience being a delight when He told His disciples, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work” (John 4:34).
Think about it this way: Jesus forgave those who had wronged Him, He loved those who were unlovable, and He served those who were never satisfied, yet He said that obedience was His very “food”–His nourishment that gave Him strength. He delighted in living in obedience to the commands of His Father in heaven. Shortly before He was going to submit to beatings, scourging, crucifixion, and the unimaginable horror of being subjected to the righteous wrath of God against your sins and mine and the sins of all who would ever and will ever trust in His atoning death, Jesus said:
“My heart is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name!” (John 12:27-28).
Jesus “did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. . . . He humbled himself and became obedient to death–even death on a cross!” (Philippians 2:6-8). This is the example that our Lord set for us. The desire of our hearts should be to do the will of Him who called us by His own glory and goodness (2 Peter 1:3). Obedience is never a burden for those who love God, because one of the primary blessings God gives His children is a transformed heart that turns the duty of obedience (which we all owe to Him) into an unimaginable delight.
May that be the confession of all our lives.
This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!
Grace for the Race 