Why study and obey Scripture?
We need to study, know and obey the Word of God. We can’t underestimate the importance of this issue in our Christian lives.
Our failure, Christ’s perfection
If we are to understand the story of Scripture, we must start in the beginning. God created the entire world by His word, but the apex of God’s creation came when He created man on the sixth day. Man was created in God’s image and designed to reflect God to the rest of creation. However, that image was distorted because of sin.
In the same way, God’s will for our lives is that we would glorify Him forever in all that we say and do. Yet, because of sin, we are unable to do that. God designed man to please Him by being obedient to the calling that He gave on our lives. We have failed Him in this task. We have all fallen short of the glory of God, and we are all marred by sin.
Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, is the only One that perfectly pleased the Father. Throughout Scripture, we see that Jesus pleased the Father (Matt. 3:17). In other places, we see that Christ is the perfect fulfillment of the image of God (2 Cor. 4:4, Col. 1:15, John 14:9). Jesus Christ is the only one who lived a perfect life (2 Cor. 5:21).
Imitating the Son
It’s safe to say, if we wish to please the Father, we must imitate the Son. But how? By being obedient to the Word of God.
God’s will for our lives is our sanctification, in which we are increasingly conformed to His image in our lives (1 Thess. 4:3). This happens by our constant self-denial and obedience to the Word of God. It is through God’s Word that He gives life. We see that in the first pages of Genesis, and we see it throughout the rest of His Word. If we wish to please God, we must live in total submission to His will for our lives. We cannot separate the will of God from the Word of God. For those of us that are Christians, we are being transformed into the image of Christ every day through the work of the Spirit in our submission to the will of the Father.
Remember, God creates through the power of His Word. He brings to life what wasn’t there before. We were all sinners and we are brought to life through His Word (Rom. 10:14-17). Therefore, if we wish to fulfill the command that God has placed on our lives, we must continually submit to His Word. We will be more like Christ when we, by the power of the Spirit, yield to ourselves and begin following Him.
The Word leads to joy
When I find myself at a loss for joy in the Father, it is usually a result of my unwillingness to submit to His Word. It’s through the constant submission to God’s will that I find myself truly satisfied.
The reason we study and obey Scripture is because we remember what it’s like to live outside of God’s Word and what it means to be saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. We know the depth of our sin and the depth of God’s grace that covered that sin. We understand what it was like to be spiritually dead, and now we desire to be more like Christ because we have been made new creations.
If we have been made new, we must live as if we have been made new. Let’s not be content with simply being saved, but instead know the joy of continuously being made into the image of our Redeemer. Let’s study Scripture.
Josh Chambers is the lead pastor of Pleasant Street Baptist Church in Worcester, MA. He blogs regularly at thereformedlife.net. You can follow him on Instagram @jchambers5 and on Twitter @josh_chambers5.