How do you do what Jesus would do when you feel so wronged and all you want to do is lash out or fight back?
I love God with all my heart and every day I just want to please him in appreciation of his indescribable love for me.
Living in a fallen world
If I lived on island all by myself, this would be so easy. But alas, I have to live in a fallen world among co-fallen and co-wounded people who are ready tools in the hands of the enemy set to thwart my plans of obedience.
Choosing God
So how do you do obedience to God in the face of people’s unfair treatment? How do you do what Jesus would do when you feel so wronged and all you want to do is lash out or fight back? My friend, you choose God. Period.
You refuse to give that person or that situation the power to control you. No matter who, no matter what, your God must remain bigger. Your desire to say ‘Yes’ to God always must trump your flesh and its desires to give someone a piece of your mind or worse.
Read Also: Who are you?
Of course it’s hard
Now, what I just said is by no means easy. In recent times, I have had cause to hold myself back with all my strength. I wanted to let it rip. I wanted to yell and scream. I wanted to just deal with this situation in the flesh and to hell with the consequences. But I just couldn’t. My desire to obey God was thankfully stronger or shall I say more important.
I won’t lie my response was not pristine but in the end I stayed still. I let God Win. In me. For me.
Yes, you do feel like a ‘Mumu’
Letting God have his way in us. Being Christ-like. Turning the other cheek. Being still in the face of grave injustice (when directed by God). Paying back good for evil. All of this, in the eyes of the world, is you being a ‘Mumu’; a wimp,a plain door mat. They ask you ‘why are you taking that?’.
If you are like me you hold back your tears and respond: “Nobody is worth me losing my peace with God”. Yes, it’s painful but I’m constrained by God’s spirit in me to be still. Like Jesus, I’m intent on doing only what I hear God tell me to do.
Real Strength
Truth be told, there in lies real strength actually. You see, it’s way easier to give in to the flesh because that’s our default setting. To allow the Spirit of God to keep you in check? To not give in to the need to respond? To not take any drastic steps out of anger?
In short, ‘stooping to conquer’ requires serious inner strength. Just look at Jesus! Considering who he was, one could say his response to the Roman soldiers was very ‘mumuish’ but you and I know who came out tops in that face-off. Yes, Jesus did and it is Him we are called to emulate.
Read Also: Before i was born
So when it sucks
Obeying God may suck sometimes and when it does, here’s what I think we should do. We must take a moment to picture Christ on the Cross, hanging there for you and me. Beaten, broken, humiliated, cursed and forsaken by his own Father. I bet that sucked for him being up there, hunh? But he did it anyway. Why? In obedience to a God who loved us so much he sacrificed his only son to give us eternal life.
John Piper puts it this way:
....”when Jesus suffered without retaliating, he was leaving us an example to follow....,He handed his cause over to God (1 Peter 2:21) and did not try to settle accounts with retaliation. He banked his hope on the resurrection and all the joys of reunion with his Father and the redemption of his people. So should we.”
Bottom line? When radical obedience to God sucks, do it anyway.
Salt Essien-Nelson is PapaGod’s Daughter and a Blogger/Author based in Lagos, Nigeria.