Why Is This So Hard?

Mark Twain once said, “It ain’t the parts of the Bible that I don’t understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand.”  

At first blush, it seems like an odd thing to say, but upon closer examination, we begin to identify with his discomfort.  

There are some things contained in the Scriptures that are difficult to understand; there is no doubt about that.  However, the essentials of the faith are really quite easy to understand.  

The difficulty comes in living them out.

Living them out requires obedience, and let’s face it, obedience is hard.

I don’t know about you, but I would rather learn something new than put into action something that I don’t want to do.

Learning is fun. Obedience is hard.

Our culture is obsessed with acquiring knowledge. Every day it pushes us to learn more and more. 

We listen to podcasts for information, read books for information, watch TedTalks to learn something we never knew, and watch YouTube videos to gain knowledge about a project before we start. 

Again, our culture is obsessed with knowledge, but knowledge does not impress God… obedience does. 

Yet in the church, we are drawn to knowledge over obedience.

I have said this many times before: most of us who have been in church for a while are educated FAR beyond our obedience. 

What I mean is we have sat through Bible study after Bible study and attended hundreds of sermons, yet we have not DONE much with what has been asked of us.

James, the brother of Jesus, wrote these words about just sitting and listening in James 1:22.

“But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves.”

James says that if we are not obeying what has been laid in front of us, we are fooling ourselves. What are we fooling ourselves of? We are fooling ourselves that we are maturing spiritually. 

Most of us, and I include myself in this category as well, don’t need another sermon where we are entertained by learning something new. We need to go back and just start doing what God has already asked us to do.

So let me ask you a question.

What has God asked you to do but you haven’t done?

Whatever it is, the most spiritually maturing thing that you could do right now is simply be obedient and do it.

• Maybe God has asked you to offer up forgiveness to someone that hurt you or wronged you. 

• Maybe God has asked you to take responsibility for your roll in your bad marriage. 

• Maybe God has asked you to stop ignoring your addiction problem and get some help. 

• Maybe God has asked that you stop gossiping with others at work or school. 

• Maybe God has asked you to start a business.

• Maybe he has asked you to use your talents and serve some role in the church.

• Maybe God has been asking you to trust him with your finances by giving a percentage of your income back to him.

I could probably make the list a mile long. My point is this. I don’t need another sermon. You don’t need another sermon. What you and I need, if Jesus is going to be the center of our lives, is to obey what he has already asked us to do.

Just like Mark Twain said, most of the Scriptures are not that complicated to understand. It's just hard to apply what you already understand.

To obey or not, the choice is yours.

Choose wisely.