Obedience to God–Transaction or Relationship?

Sometimes we read a passage like John 15:9-10 and slip into a transactional frame of mind. Jesus said to his disciples, “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love.”

From a transactional viewpoint, one might reason from this passage that God’s love for us hinges on our obedience. In other words, “If you don’t obey him, he won’t love you.” But we cannot keep with sound doctrine and claim that the Father’s love for Jesus was contingent on Jesus’ obedience. Yet that’s what a transactional viewpoint would demand from this passage. Such thinking is pagan and foreign to the Scriptures.

Remaining, abiding or living in God’s love is totally relational. The connection Jesus gives us here between remaining in his love and obedience is very simple—and very relational. In fact, I just witnessed this truth the other day observing my grandson, Jack. Jack was being mean to his sister and disobedient to his parents. In his disobedience, he became aloof from his parents and interacted with them in pride, anger and rebellion.

Meanwhile, they never ceased to love him, but Jack could not experience their love because of his stubborn attitude. He could not “remain in” their love because he refused to receive their love as genuine. In his current frame of mind, he could not enjoy his parents’ love for him.

Fortunately, Jack could not stand the agony of not “remaining in” his parents’ love for long. For soon he burst into tears of repentance and came running with arms outstretched to receive their love and begin again to “live in” their love.

The issue in the John 15 passage and in Jack’s example is not obedience, but relationship. By saying that, I don’t want to diminish the importance of obedience. For God does expect obedience from us. But we must understand obedience in the context of relationship and not as a mechanical transaction. If we love him, we will want to please him. In this way, we see that obedience actually results as the fruit of “remaining in” God’s love. (See also: Ephesians 3:12; 5:1-2, 8-10; Philippians 3:7-9.)

© Rob Fischer 2009