Obedience Must Be Restored

"Obedience Must Be Restored" – 1 Samuel 15:22 Sometimes one does not know what decision to make; but if you have contact with God, you obey Him, and the one who comes out well is you. Let us not think that whatever comes into our mind is best: what is best is to obey. The trouble is that we are fickle: today we hold one opinion, tomorrow we make another decision, we grow desperate, and afterward we say that God forsook us. Years and days and good deeds may pass; but if the day of disobedience comes, obedience is broken, and restoring obedience is very hard. Saul, Abram, and Noah show us which way life falls according to whether one obeys.

I. Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams (1 Samuel 15:22).

A. The noise of disobedience.

1. Saul, not finishing with the enemy king, indulged only in what he wished to indulge: himself.

2. He never lacked an excuse nor explanations; justifying himself delighted him. Excuses are for the one who gives them, and they are always for a justification.

3. It was not the goats, nor the sheep, nor the oxen: the noise Samuel could perceive was the noise of disobedience.

4. And when we are doing disobedient things, believe it or not, everyone knows: disobedience cries out violently.

5. Of the prophets the Scriptures speak of, it is said that not one of Samuel's words fell to the ground; those words came with an action, they came already with a deed.

B. All disobedience brings defeat and brings the evil day.

1. What was said to Saul? Rejected. And a rejected person is one who, though he pray, cry out, and stamp his feet, is already rejected.

2. What God says He does not take back; for what Saul did was the utmost: the prophet rises, and the prophet is the voice of God. Whom did he defy, the prophet or God?

3. Saul's death came because he went on from folly to folly; it was a disaster. And the reason for the rejection is simple: disobedience.

4. We think that with sacrifice we quench the anger of God; but no sacrifice of ours leads anywhere, because our sacrifice was made by Jesus.

5. The blood of the Son of God was poured out, of Emmanuel, who is holy, holy, holy: that blood is holy three times over. To obey, in itself, is a good thing.

II. Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee (Genesis 12:1-9).

A. Abram obeys without knowing exactly where he goes.

1. In this dealing he was not yet Abraham: he is Abram. It is the same man; this was the beginning, for later God changes his name and changes his life for what he had to do.

2. The call asks him to leave his land, his family, and everything he knows, to go to an utterly unknown place, full of wild beasts and without protection.

3. This shows that obedience to God sometimes requires faith and letting go. And what is hard for a human being is to act in faith, for one believes if one sees.

4. God gives him three promises: a great nation, blessing and protection, and to be a blessing to others. And to this day that land still has his descendants.

5. He was not the man who kept the most order; he was the man whom the angels accompanied and who had God near.

6. Did Abram know all we can explain today? No. What did he have? Obedience and faith. And he was not conquering for himself: he conquered for all who would come.

B. He went out at seventy-five years of age.

1. Accompanied by his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, and his goods; and he said: nothing is left for me here, God has spoken to me, I must go.

2. Perhaps you will be meek at seventy-five; but begin now. And do not say it was different then: at seventy-five he was seventy-five, and that is all.

3. A man like any other, but special, chosen. And the greatness of that human being: obedient, meek, and tender toward God.

4. The first thing he does is travel through all Canaan, all but treading the land. He lived there but did not settle: he had to go from here to there. He believed what God had told him.

5. He not only set faith in motion, he not only believed, but he acted. He walked what is today the most desired land, the favorite place of every nation.

C. And there builded he an altar unto the Lord.

1. So Abram answers: raising an altar, giving Him worship and much gratitude; and pitching his tent, he builds another altar and calls on the name of God.

2. For a chosen man raises an altar to God more than anything else in life. His faith was not in words, but in worship and devotion.

3. When you stop praying and stop giving Him praise, you leave obedience altogether.

4. Where there is a servant of God there must be an altar. And what is an altar? Your knees. What other altar can you make?

5. How many troubles are there in a day? How many sicknesses torment a house? And who alone can deliver our life? God; and in that way, by having an altar.

III. Noah obeyed God in building the ark, when it had never rained that way before (Genesis 6).

A. And do you know why God chose Noah?

1. For the good thought he had, for how meek and how tender he was toward God, and because he had communion with God.

2. He is described as just and perfect in all his generations, one who walked with God in the midst of a wholly corrupt society.

3. The earth was filled with violence, and humanity had drifted so far from God that everything was defiled by sin.

4. They lived nine hundred and eight hundred years, and Noah was not the eldest; his relatives had to be older. And they did not believe him: they mocked him, despised him, humiliated him.

5. Even seeing all his eyes saw, in him there was obedience: age does not matter, the years do not matter, what matters is obeying God. A hundred-odd years building the ark.

B. The announcement of judgment and the instruction.

1. God decides to destroy every living thing by a flood; but before executing judgment He gives Noah clear instructions for being saved.

2. The ark was to be of gopher wood, covered with pitch, with exact measurements. He gave him the measurements; and as He gave the measurements, He also provided.

3. Out of all the people, God looks down here and knows which of you is obedient. If children today are disobedient, what is left for the adult?

4. Disobedience comes from Satan. Was it not he who ruined it all? God made Adam and Eve, and he was hidden there watching how he would destroy.

5. All who lived then had before their eyes what could have produced faith: seeing the ark, and seeing the first drops fall. But the doors had already been shut.

C. The covenant and the preserving.

1. God establishes a covenant with Noah, promising to preserve him together with his family: the consequence of an obedient man.

2. He orders him to gather a pair of every kind and food enough for all. God attends to everything; that is Jehovah Jireh, who always provides.

3. The Lord blesses the just man, prospers him, and fills his going out and his coming in with good. Life is not a tale: God backs and guards.

4. Thus did Noah; according to all that God commanded him, so did he. He was blessed, he had welfare, and he prospered in his going out and his coming in.

IV. True faith shows itself in concrete action (Hebrews 11:7).

A. Faith that obeys without questioning.

1. Though it had never rained that way before, and though nothing was written about a flood, Noah acted.

2. His obedience shows that, though the world be full of wickedness, it is possible to walk with God. It may be full, and the earth is full; but you must know that you are obedient.

3. For the obedient man lowers his shoulder. The meek is the one who conquers, the one who lies down in peace, and the one who rises in the morning confident that God is with him.

4. If one obeys Him, we will always have God on our side.

B. God always gives instructions and opportunities before a judgment.

1. If God spoke on this subject today, work on your life and meet with God at some moment of this very day.

2. One decides how he wants that future. For do you know what the mercy of God does? It seeks to save the obedient.

3. Life is not a day that passes: it is a day we can lose; and in what we lose, we lose eternity.

4. The more stubborn we are, the harder we hit the wall, the more we lose, and the more the devil mocks. He will not carry you off: you will go by yourself.

5. Never, never leave obedience; for what brought you back to the Master was the fear that comes of obedience. Amen.