Simplicity

Do you remember the once-popular comedy “Here’s Your Sign”?   This comedy routine began by stating that stupid people should have to wear warning signs for their lack of common sense.  Perhaps what made this so funny is how absolutely true how otherwise smart-intelligent-bright people all have moments of absolute senselessness!

 

Oswald Chambers begins one of his daily devotions with this statement: “Simplicity is the secret to seeing things clearly.”  My Nanny would have put it like this: “Don’t make a mountain out of a mole hill.”  How many times have I distinctly heard God say “do this,” only to respond “I’ll pray about it.”  Let me break this down: okay, I’m going to “pray about” something on which God has already spoken?  Mrs. Grace, a precious senior saint, would say: “Why are you arguing with God?”  Well, Beverly, here’s your sign!   Intellectually, we can think through and reason matters but with spiritual things, there is only one resolve to understanding – that is, obedience.  As we “trust and obey,” we avoid wandering thoughts and confusion.  Paul warned against over-thinking rather than simple obedience which leads us “astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ” (ESV) or “from the simplicity that is in Christ.” (KJV) (2 Corinthians 11:3b).  I propose spiritual confusion is never divine; submission through obedience, however, always clarifies!  All is clear when “we destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take very thought captive to obey Christ” (2 Corinthians 10;5).  Oh, yes, I’ve scratched my head and said, “Beverly, that was just plain dumb.”  Let it never be said, however, of those who claim Christ that we have chosen worldly reason over spiritual obedience.  Want to avoid your “sign”?  Hear Him then obey!