A Happy Heart

When I was a child, a ministry called Life Action came to our church multiple times to host week-long church events. On at least one occasion, their visit was extended as God was working powerfully in our midst. In fact, it is through the ministry of Life Action that both my parents came to know the Lord personally, and by extension me as well, since it was through their witness after their conversion that I, too, became a follower of Jesus.

During the sessions every evening, the adults would sit under preaching while the kids would have their own time of teaching and activities. It was during this time that I learned the definition of obedience, taught in a sing-song way with hand motions, which is why I still remember it today: “Obedience is doing what you’re told to do, when you’re told to do it, with a happy heart.” Remove any one of those phrases, and you don’t have true obedience.

Most of us 90s kids there knew that if our parents told us to do something and we didn’t do it, then we were being disobedient. But the next part was a bit uncomfortable. If we said we would do the thing and even intended to do it, but decided to do it later, after we had finished whatever we were engaged in at the moment, then we weren’t being truly obedient. In other words, delayed obedience is disobedience. I remember after learning this lesson that I tried to change my practice from delaying to either obeying right away or simply asking, “May I finish this chapter (or song) first?” (because let’s be honest, I was usually either reading or playing piano when the parental instructions came along). Most of the time, the answer was “Yes,” but when it was “No,” I had the choice to defy my parents in disobedience by delaying anyway or to stop what I was doing and obey. Making the right choice wasn’t always easy, but it was what I was called to do as a child who followed Jesus—to honor my father and mother.

However difficult that part might have been, though, it was nothing compared to the last part—“with a happy heart.” Sure, I might have been able to master the “doing what I was told to do when I was told to do it,” but was I happy about it? Or was I inwardly—or outwardly—grumbling that I had to stop my very enjoyable pastime and get up to unload the dishwasher or run upstairs to get something for Mom? The uncomfortable truth was that if I was just going through the motions but was doing so with a complaining spirit, I wasn’t being truly obedient.

That’s all well and good, you might be thinking, but what does that have to do with me, a 2020s adult? Well, everything, really. Because just as children are called to honor and obey their earthly parents, God’s children—of every age—are called to honor and obey Him. And for us, the definition of obedience is the same. “Obedience is doing what we’re told to do, when we’re told to do it, with a happy heart.”

Did you know that the Bible actually talks about the heart when it comes to obedience? Read these words from Romans 6:16-18 (ESV) and see if you can pick it out:

Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.

Did you see it? “Obedient from the heart”—in other words, truly obedient. But how on earth were the recipients of Paul’s letter able to become obedient from the heart? And how are we to be able to always do what God tells us to do with a heart of happiness? I might sacrifice my time, have a difficult conversation, or go somewhere He is calling me to go, but am I happy about it? Or am I inwardly—or outwardly—grumbling that I have to stop my comfortable and enjoyable activities to do what He has instructed me to do?

I don’t know about you, but that war between my old self (my flesh) and my new self is an ongoing battle. But the fact that there is a battle should be of great encouragement to us. It means that our heart of stone has been replaced with a new heart (see Ezekiel 36:26). Before coming to know Jesus, our heart is unable to obey with happiness. We might be able to go through the motions, but we can never be truly obedient because our hearts are bent toward selfishness and self-righteousness when doing so. But when we surrender to Jesus, He gives us a new heart, and through this gift we are able to truly obey Him. We can honestly say with David, “I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart” (Psalm 40:8, ESV).

God doesn’t just demand complete obedience from us. He also graciously gives us the tools necessary to obey. He literally changes our heart and puts His own Spirit in us, making it possible for us to be truly obedient. Through our new heart, inhabited by the Holy Spirit, we have a power indwelling us that is able to defeat our griping, complaining, feet-dragging flesh and give us the strength to choose willing and glad obedience to what is asked of us. So let’s not ignore or attempt to quench that power. Let’s not cheapen the gift made possible by Jesus’ perfect life, substitutionary death, and victorious resurrection by failing to apply it to our lives. Let’s live in the truth that we are freed from our bondage to sin and begin obeying God completely—with a happy heart.

PC: Eric Eanes. Used with permission.