“But this command I gave them: ‘Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people. And walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.’” (Jeremiah 7:23, ESV)
Everything you do in life has consequences. Your decisions, your choices, your attitude, your loves, your dreams, your thoughts…. all have consequences. A choice made one day will affect you a day later or a year later. A mistake made one year might ruin another year. Little mistakes often pile up to the point of big problems. Food choices over days or months will affect your health for years to come.
Your spiritual life also has consequences. If you neglect your prayers, you will lose your connection with God and feel less whole. When you sin, it will alter your spiritual chemistry, affect your thoughts, and bleed problems into other areas of your life. When you repeat a sin multiple times and refuse to repent, you will inevitably fall into a cycle of sin and reap unwanted results. Should you harbor sinful lusts, desires will erode your peace.
In the scripture reading for today, we see evidence of GOOD CONSEQUENCES. Just like sinful choices can produce negative results, godly choices can reap wonderful benefits. In Jeremiah 7:23, the prophet Jeremiah is told by God to remind the people of Israel that if they “obey God’s voice”, God will be in a fruitful relationship with them. The result? “All will go well with them” (Jeremiah 7:23b). When you “walk in the way” that God commands, things turn out for the better. The overarching theme in this verse is that faithful obedience to God produces good things in your life.
Many Christians have a negative view of obedience. They see a relationship with obedience as “slave-centric”. In other words, when you become obedient, you give up your freedom. Obedience is thus seen as a negative in life. It is something to be dreaded or abhorred. It is something that involves drudgery and groveling. It is to be avoided at all costs. This is hardly the view of obedience in the Bible. Verses like Jeremiah 7:23 hold up obedience to God as something that is healthy and worthy. It brings blessings. It will cause consequences in your life to turn out “well”.
In this verse of the Bible, there is a direct correlation between obedience to God and a good life. You can’t have a good life without obedience to God. On the contrary, the lack of obedience to God will not turn out well for anyone. I have found this to be an absolute truth not only the spiritual life but in every aspect of life. The absence of an obedience to God IN ANY PART OF YOUR LIFE will result in less wellness, in sickness, in loss. If you want to ever feel true peace or true wholeness in your life, you will need to practice obedience to God. God’s commands and voice must be heeded.
Years ago, I met a man who lived a few blocks from the parsonage. I thought he was retired, but later found out he was fully disabled. In speaking with him, I found out that he was injured at work. He lost about ten percent of the use of his leg due to an accident at a faulty press at the machine shop where he worked. Come to find out, the press had been neglected. Preventative maintenance had been ignored.
While recuperating from the injury at work, the man was approached by a lawyer. The lawyer got the man to sue his employer for a huge amount. Even though the man lost only ten percent of the use of his leg, the lawyer talked the man into a lawsuit worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. In the end, the man received almost a million dollars from the company. The lawyer had a big payday. The man was excited about the payout. Because the company’s guilt in the injury was wholly overblown in court and the man’s injuries were overstated, the settlement had been large. The company was hit with huge fines and several employees had to be laid off while the company was forced to do expensive upgrades. The man was shunned from future employment in machinery work. He didn’t care. He had lots of money to play with a didn’t see the need to ever work again.
Now, you might think that this court case was wonderful. An injured worker was compensated. A machine shop that had skirted maintenance work, thus putting its employees at risk, was forced to change their ways. In some respects, you are right. But the man’s lawsuit brought bad spiritual consequences. Two of the man’s best friends were laid off at the company while upgrades were made to equipment. Their families had a very difficult time financially. Guilt bothered the man greatly. Here he was rolling in thousands of dollars, while his best friends and their families had a difficult time putting food on the table. Also, unable to find work at any local machine shop due to the settlement, the man could no longer feel the satisfaction of a good day’s work or an honest salary. On the other hand, his wife loved the windfall of money. She bought lots of expensive jewelry, rode a new car every few years, and spent thousands updating her kitchen. All these consequences caused him to be depressed, lose his self-worth, feel guilt toward his friends’ situations, and become a recluse. His wife seemed more interested in the money than in their marriage. He never did quite recover from this lawsuit. Despite having lots of money in savings, he seldom enjoyed his freedom for the rest of his life.
I can’t believe that God would have wanted the man to “stick it to the company” so harshly that others lost their income. I also cannot believe that God would have wanted the man to receive all that money from an overblown lawsuit in order to indulge his wife’s spending habits or his own bank account. The big payout from the lawsuit brought by the lawyer soured not only this man’s life but his marriage, his self-image, and his spiritual life. Everything you do in life has consequences… good and bad. I wonder now if the man even talked to God about the lawsuit before the money clouded his judgment.
It is important that you obey God’s voice in all that you do. With every decision, every choice, every direction you take, invite God to inform your actions and attitude. Speak frequently to God in prayer. Listen for direction from the Holy Spirit. Follow closely God’s commands in scripture. Otherwise, things will not go “well” for you. Remember, there is a direct correlation between obedience to God and things going well in your life. Today’s scripture not only claims that, but history has proven this to be true. Hollywood elites who do not obey God’s voice will fall into disrepute. Atheists who ignore God’s commands will feel the emptiness of worldly lives. Sinners will reap the consequences of their poor choices, unless they repent. Sooner or later, the faithful will always be blessed by God.
Are you suffering any bad consequences from the poor choices of the past? Are there sins in your life still needing repentance? Are you committed to obeying God’s voice? God wants things to go well in your life. God wants to bless your actions. That all hinges on your willingness to heed God’s voice and follow God’s leading.
Your spiritual life also has consequences. If you neglect your prayers, you will lose your connection with God and feel less whole. When you sin, it will alter your spiritual chemistry, affect your thoughts, and bleed problems into other areas of your life. When you repeat a sin multiple times and refuse to repent, you will inevitably fall into a cycle of sin and reap unwanted results. Should you harbor sinful lusts, desires will erode your peace.
In the scripture reading for today, we see evidence of GOOD CONSEQUENCES. Just like sinful choices can produce negative results, godly choices can reap wonderful benefits. In Jeremiah 7:23, the prophet Jeremiah is told by God to remind the people of Israel that if they “obey God’s voice”, God will be in a fruitful relationship with them. The result? “All will go well with them” (Jeremiah 7:23b). When you “walk in the way” that God commands, things turn out for the better. The overarching theme in this verse is that faithful obedience to God produces good things in your life.
Many Christians have a negative view of obedience. They see a relationship with obedience as “slave-centric”. In other words, when you become obedient, you give up your freedom. Obedience is thus seen as a negative in life. It is something to be dreaded or abhorred. It is something that involves drudgery and groveling. It is to be avoided at all costs. This is hardly the view of obedience in the Bible. Verses like Jeremiah 7:23 hold up obedience to God as something that is healthy and worthy. It brings blessings. It will cause consequences in your life to turn out “well”.
In this verse of the Bible, there is a direct correlation between obedience to God and a good life. You can’t have a good life without obedience to God. On the contrary, the lack of obedience to God will not turn out well for anyone. I have found this to be an absolute truth not only the spiritual life but in every aspect of life. The absence of an obedience to God IN ANY PART OF YOUR LIFE will result in less wellness, in sickness, in loss. If you want to ever feel true peace or true wholeness in your life, you will need to practice obedience to God. God’s commands and voice must be heeded.
Years ago, I met a man who lived a few blocks from the parsonage. I thought he was retired, but later found out he was fully disabled. In speaking with him, I found out that he was injured at work. He lost about ten percent of the use of his leg due to an accident at a faulty press at the machine shop where he worked. Come to find out, the press had been neglected. Preventative maintenance had been ignored.
While recuperating from the injury at work, the man was approached by a lawyer. The lawyer got the man to sue his employer for a huge amount. Even though the man lost only ten percent of the use of his leg, the lawyer talked the man into a lawsuit worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. In the end, the man received almost a million dollars from the company. The lawyer had a big payday. The man was excited about the payout. Because the company’s guilt in the injury was wholly overblown in court and the man’s injuries were overstated, the settlement had been large. The company was hit with huge fines and several employees had to be laid off while the company was forced to do expensive upgrades. The man was shunned from future employment in machinery work. He didn’t care. He had lots of money to play with a didn’t see the need to ever work again.
Now, you might think that this court case was wonderful. An injured worker was compensated. A machine shop that had skirted maintenance work, thus putting its employees at risk, was forced to change their ways. In some respects, you are right. But the man’s lawsuit brought bad spiritual consequences. Two of the man’s best friends were laid off at the company while upgrades were made to equipment. Their families had a very difficult time financially. Guilt bothered the man greatly. Here he was rolling in thousands of dollars, while his best friends and their families had a difficult time putting food on the table. Also, unable to find work at any local machine shop due to the settlement, the man could no longer feel the satisfaction of a good day’s work or an honest salary. On the other hand, his wife loved the windfall of money. She bought lots of expensive jewelry, rode a new car every few years, and spent thousands updating her kitchen. All these consequences caused him to be depressed, lose his self-worth, feel guilt toward his friends’ situations, and become a recluse. His wife seemed more interested in the money than in their marriage. He never did quite recover from this lawsuit. Despite having lots of money in savings, he seldom enjoyed his freedom for the rest of his life.
I can’t believe that God would have wanted the man to “stick it to the company” so harshly that others lost their income. I also cannot believe that God would have wanted the man to receive all that money from an overblown lawsuit in order to indulge his wife’s spending habits or his own bank account. The big payout from the lawsuit brought by the lawyer soured not only this man’s life but his marriage, his self-image, and his spiritual life. Everything you do in life has consequences… good and bad. I wonder now if the man even talked to God about the lawsuit before the money clouded his judgment.
It is important that you obey God’s voice in all that you do. With every decision, every choice, every direction you take, invite God to inform your actions and attitude. Speak frequently to God in prayer. Listen for direction from the Holy Spirit. Follow closely God’s commands in scripture. Otherwise, things will not go “well” for you. Remember, there is a direct correlation between obedience to God and things going well in your life. Today’s scripture not only claims that, but history has proven this to be true. Hollywood elites who do not obey God’s voice will fall into disrepute. Atheists who ignore God’s commands will feel the emptiness of worldly lives. Sinners will reap the consequences of their poor choices, unless they repent. Sooner or later, the faithful will always be blessed by God.
Are you suffering any bad consequences from the poor choices of the past? Are there sins in your life still needing repentance? Are you committed to obeying God’s voice? God wants things to go well in your life. God wants to bless your actions. That all hinges on your willingness to heed God’s voice and follow God’s leading.