delighting in obedience

Obedience.
Boy how that word can cause such a stirring of positive or negative emotion. Either I am for it or against it....
and to be honest, I am all about it when I am training or teaching my child why it is not okay to play on the computer when I told her to go put the dishes away....or to come to me and not run away when I say it is time for bed....
But me? What do I have to obey. First of all, I am grown and don't live with my mama and daddy. I'm not in a classroom and I don't work outside the home... So, there. I don't need to obey anyone but myself,right,... because, is there really anyone over me, telling me what to do?

As a Christian, I have to change my thinking about obedience and how it can work in me. I can look back over my five years of being in Christ and say that I have obeyed God sometimes...I fall short of course as everyone.... But I also can say that I can try harder at the very least to obey God all the time. I know that my Lord and Savior died for me, took my place, felt my sins, felt all kinds of pain, just for me to have a relationship with Him.... He enables me to obey God in ALL areas of my life. The Holy Spirit living inside of me helps me, leads me, guides me, and encourages me to live a life obedient to Him....and yet, knowing all this seems to be the easy part. Doing it is, well,... hard... and it is not something that happens of course overnight.

Why and how could I possible obey the one true God, when my flesh, my mind, my thoughts are telling me to do something else? I have learned that it takes prayer and surrender to trully allow God to work in me to help me to obey Him. To obey Him even when I don't feel like obeying Him. Even when my flesh is telling me no...do it my way....I know best!

The other day I had to apologize to my oldest daughter for my attitude towards her. It was late and I was grumpy and irritable...I just wanted to go to bed. I was wrong in my attitude and when I finally layed my head down on the pillow I knew in my heart that I was wrong...the Lord convicted me and I tried to justify it.
Yet what is so great about knowing my Lord as my personal Savior is that I know that if I accept that I am wrong and ask for forgiveness, He is faithful to cleanse me of all unrightousness....to be free once again from the weight of my sin... So here I am tonight...praying...thinking...asking the Lord to help me be obedient to Him in all areas of my life. To help me be content where I am, to help me discipline my life, to be still and know that He is God. To pray and pray and pray all day...to be reminded to pray and focus my whole being on Him and Him alone....

My heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it? I, the LORD search the heart and examine the mind, to reward a man according to his conduct, according to what his deeds deserve. -Jer.17:9-10