The Joy of Obedience
Very few people can read this without being a different person afterward
BY HANNAH WHITALL SMITH
L ong ago I came across this sentence, “Perfect obedience would be perfect happiness if only we had perfect confi dence in the power we were obey ing.” I remember being struck with the saying as the revelation of a possible, although hitherto un- dreamed-of, way of happiness; and often afterwards, even when full of inward rebellion, did that saying recur to me as the vision of a rest, and yet of a possible development, that would soothe, and at the same time satisfy all my yearnings. Need I say that this rest has been revealed to me now, not as a vision, but as a reality; and that I have seen in the Lord Jesus the Master to whom we may yield up our im plicit obedience, and, taking His yoke upon us, may find our per fect rest? The Master has revealed Himself to you, and is calling for your complete surrender, and you shrink and hesitate. A measure of sur render you are willing to make, and think indeed it is fit and proper that you should. But an utter aban donment, without any reserves, seems to you too much to be asked for. You are afraid of it. It involves too much, you think, and is too great a risk. To be measurably obedient you desire; to be perfectly obedient appalls you. On a Wide Path, an Easy Conscience Then, too, you see other souls who seem able to walk with easy consciences in a far wider path than that which appears to be marked
out for you, and you ask yourself why this need he. It seems strange, and perhaps hard to you, that you must do what they need not, and must leave undone what they have liberty to do. Ah, dear Christian, this very dif ference between you is your priv ilege, though you do not yet know it. Your Lord says, “He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me; and he that loveth me shall he loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.” You have His commandments; those you envy have them not. You know the mind of your Lord about many things, in which, as yet they are walking in darkness. Is not this a privilege? Is it a cause for regret that your soul is brought into such near and intimate relations with your Master that He is able to tell you things which those who are farther off may not know? Do you not realize what a tender degree of intimacy is implied in this? There are many relations in life that require from the different par ties only very moderate degrees of devotion. We may have really pleasant friendships with one an other, and yet spend a large part of our lives in separate interests and widely differing pu r sui t s . When together, we may greatly enjoy one another’s society, and find many congenial points; but separation is not any especial dis tress to us, and other and more intimate friendships do not inter fere. There is not enough love be
tween us to give us either the right or the desire to enter into and share one another’s most private affairs. A certain degree of reserve and distance seems to be the suitable thing in such relations as these. A Love That1 Gives All But there are other relations in life where all this is changed. The friendship becomes love. The two hearts give themselves to each other, to be no longer two, but one. A union of soul takes place, which makes all that belongs to one the property of the other. Separate in terests and separate paths in life are no longer possible. Things that were lawful before become unlaw ful now because of the nearness of the tie that binds. The reserve and distance suitable to mere friendship become fatal in love. Love gives all, and must have all in return. The wishes of one become binding ob ligations to the other, and the deep est desire of each heart is that it may know every secret wish or longing of the other in order that it may fly on the wings of the wind to gratify it. Do such as these chafe under this yoke which love imposes? Do they envy the cool, calm, reason able friendships they see around them, and regret the nearness into which their souls are brought to their beloved one because of the obligations it creates? Do they not rather glory in these very obliga tions, and inwardly pity, with a tender yet exulting joy, the poor far-off ones who dare not come
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