I’ve recently seen the question posed as to whether I would kill a baby if God told me. I’ll go on and say that I answered the question, yes. Why? He’s God, and if he commands it, he must have a reason I don’t understand. However, while I saw several Christians give the same answer, I considered something else later on about that.
It’s amazing that many of us would stand up and say “Yes. I’d do that.” However, such commands while we hope may never happen are not what we have been commanded to do. Before we put up our bravado, I think we should look at the commands God has given us and see how we’re doing so far.
God commands me not to worry. I’m doing terrible at that.
God commands me to trust him in all things. That’s a hard one.
The Ten Commandments? I’ve broken them all at least so far as Christ tells us to take them. What guy hasn’t lusted before?
Be devoted to prayer? Am I really?
Give to the poor? Can I be stingy?
Love my neighbor as myself? Am I too often thinking of myself?
Seek wisdom? Do I always seek it.
We could list many more commands.
The point is that we just don’t follow them like we should and I’ll be the first to confess that. I would say we should do whatever God commands us to do (Though let’s be sure it is him. There are too many who think God tells them to blow up abortion clinics and such.), but I think we could be too quick to say what we would do.
Peter boasted before Christ that he would never deny him. What happens? He denies him three times in the presence of Christ. Don’t you think there was some shame when he saw Christ afterwards? I think we should learn from that. A lot of us say we’d be willing to die for Christ, but before we say that, let’s access ourselves. I will simply say “I hope I would.” I really do hope that if push came to shove, I would, but I’m not going to come out with any bravado on my part just yet.
What can I learn from this then? What can you learn? We should do what God commands. At least, we should try. I fear we’ll fail too often, but before we speak out bravely, maybe we should remember that without him, we can’t even walk. Let’s not be prideful lest we fall.
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