OBEDIENCE

There are some words we hear through the wounds of our culture before we ever stop to understand the depth of what they actually mean.

Obedience is one of those words.

So is submission.

For many people, those words immediately sound like control.

Power.

One person surrendering their voice, independence, or agency to another.

And when those words have been misused by people seeking authority rather than responsibility, it is understandable why they can make us uncomfortable.

But biblical obedience was never intended to mean becoming powerless beneath another human being.

At its heart, obedience is responsive trust.

It is hearing God, trusting God, and allowing what He has said to govern what we do—even when what He asks of us conflicts with what we feel in that particular moment.

Submission, likewise, is not the destruction of our agency.

It is the intentional decision to place our will beneath something greater than our immediate wants.

And perhaps nowhere is that more difficult—or more necessary—than inside a marriage.

“Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.”
— Ephesians 5:21

That verse comes before the instructions given to husbands and wives.

Marriage was never supposed to become a competition over who gets to control whom.

It was supposed to become a place where two people continually learn how to die to selfishness.

Where pride becomes humility.

Where entitlement becomes service.

Where “What am I getting from you?” slowly becomes:

“How can I love you well?”

A husband is commanded to love his wife with the sacrificial love Christ demonstrated for the Church.

A wife is called to honor and walk faithfully alongside her husband.

And both ultimately live beneath the authority of God.

That means neither spouse was ever created to become the other person’s god.

Your husband cannot carry the responsibility of being the source of your identity.

Your wife cannot carry the responsibility of being the source of your peace.

Your children cannot carry the responsibility of giving your life meaning.

Those are burdens human beings were never designed to carry.

God is the source.

Every person we love is a gift.

But the Giver must never be replaced by the gift.

Sometimes we enter relationships believing another human being is responsible for making us happy. Then, when seasons become difficult, when emotions change, when marriage requires sacrifice instead of excitement, we begin searching somewhere else for what we believe has disappeared.

A different relationship.

A different person.

A different environment.

A different life.

And we can begin swinging from one branch to another—relationship to relationship, marriage to marriage—hoping the next person will finally provide something that was never theirs to provide in the first place.

But changing people does not automatically change the condition of our hearts.

Sometimes the uncomfortable question is not:

“Where can I find happiness?”

It is:

“Am I walking in obedience to God?”

Because obedience requires something our culture increasingly tells us to avoid:

self-denial.

Jesus did not teach us that love means doing whatever feels good in the moment.

He showed us a love willing to sacrifice.

A love willing to serve.

A love willing to forgive.

A love willing to humble itself.

A love willing to remain obedient even when obedience was costly.

That does not mean remaining in abuse, tolerating violence, surrendering healthy boundaries, or allowing another person to weaponize Scripture against you.

Biblical submission should never become theological camouflage for coercion or control.

But neither should the misuse of a biblical principle cause us to discard the principle itself.

Disobedience Has Consequences

There is another side of obedience that Scripture repeatedly warns us about:

disobedience has consequences.

Adam and Eve disobeyed and immediately experienced shame, fear, and hiding.
— Genesis 3:7–10

Israel’s disobedience repeatedly fractured its relationship with God and brought consequences upon the nation.

Achan’s hidden sin affected far more people than himself.
— Joshua 7

Saul’s repeated refusal to fully obey God eventually cost him his kingdom.
— 1 Samuel 15

Scripture warns that sin produces death and separation.
— Romans 6:23

And Hebrews reminds us that God’s discipline is sometimes an expression of His love, correcting His children rather than abandoning them.
— Hebrews 12:6

Disobedience can produce guilt.

Confusion.

Broken trust.

Damaged relationships.

Restlessness.

Spiritual distance.

Consequences that reach far beyond the moment in which the decision was made.

Not because God sits in heaven waiting to destroy us for making mistakes.

But because God’s commands often function like guardrails.

They are not there simply to restrict life.

They are there because He can see farther down the road than we can.

And perhaps that is one of the hardest truths about obedience:

Sometimes God will ask us to trust Him before we understand Him.

We often want the explanation first.

God asks for faith.

We want to know where the road ends.

God asks us to take the next righteous step.

We want reassurance that obedience will produce the outcome we desire.

But biblical obedience is not a transaction where we tell God, “I obeyed You, so now You owe me the life I wanted.”

Sometimes obedience brings restoration.

Sometimes it brings redirection.

Sometimes it brings correction.

Sometimes it requires letting go.

Sometimes the blessing is not getting everything we asked for.

Sometimes the blessing is becoming the person God was shaping us to become.

“Delight yourself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart.”
— Psalm 37:4

I don’t believe that simply means God gives us everything our hearts demand.

I believe something deeper happens.

As we delight ourselves in Him, He begins transforming what our hearts desire.

And when two people within a marriage are sincerely pursuing God, submitting to Him, serving one another, communicating honestly, practicing forgiveness, rejecting selfishness, and choosing love even when love requires sacrifice, something beautiful can happen.

Marriage stops being primarily about:

“Are you making me happy?”

And begins asking:

“Are we becoming who God has called us to become?”

Because joy was never supposed to rest entirely in the hands of another imperfect human being.

Neither was our identity.

Neither was our peace.

Those belong first to God.

Maybe obedience isn’t about losing ourselves after all.

Maybe obedience is how we stop being controlled by every temporary emotion, impulse, resentment, temptation, and desire that tries to define us.

Maybe submission to God is not surrendering our freedom.

Maybe it is discovering what freedom was supposed to look like in the first place.

Because sometimes the greatest act of strength is not doing everything we have the freedom to do.

Sometimes strength is having the freedom to choose anything—

and still choosing what is right.

“To obey is better than sacrifice.”
— 1 Samuel 15:22