Let's keep it simple part 2.

So as I was doing my daily reading this simple thought came to me, it's a thought that many of us know but yet we don't put that much importance on it. What I'm talking about is simply obeying God. Now I know that seems kind of simple (that's the title :-) but I believe that's the point. So many times in my life I want to know what to do or how I can do things that would bring glory to God. Which is totally fine but I believe we concentrate on things that aren't as important as just simply obeying God. Now I'm not saying that ministry and loving on people are bad things because I do believe that they are super important but what I'm talking about are the things we place infront of obeying God. I guess an easier way to put this is these things are the stresses and worries we place on ourselves that we think make us better Christians or things that please God. They could be anything from how much we read our Bibles, how much we are involved in church, how much we pray, and how we live. These things are all good but so many times  people put such a huge emphasis on these things like how much they read, how long they pray, and even set a bar so high in their walks that it becomes unrealistic to achieve. By setting these standards we can expect to face failure because let's be real no one is perfect but because we set these standards we feel that if we don't live up to them then God will be mad at us and that we are failures. The funny thing God knows we aren't perfect and He doesn't hold us to rediculous standards.
The idea of keeping it simple by losing those unrealistic standards and focusing on just simply obeying God came from reading Genesis. We see that God created Adam then Eve and they had it made. They walked and talked with God and life was good. God even gave them dominion over everything. But we all know what happens next, they disobey and God takes it all away and now they must face the consequences. A few chapters later Noah comes on the seen. God tells him to build an arch, Noah obeys God and he's blessed for it. The cool thing about Noah's blessing is it wasn't just a pat on the head with a good job attached to it, God gave Noah the dominion that Adam had. So I know that this was a quick overview on these 8 chapters (read them and find out more ;-) but there is such a great comparison on what happens when you obey God and when you don't. Once again I'm not saying that we shouldn't strive after things to advance God's Kingdom, I'm just saying we should focus more on simply obeying God and not stressing on all those little details.
So my prayer for us today is that God would give us the strength to obey him more this year. I pray for strength and faith for us to let God be God.