Obedience Works!

1. Obedience was immediate
2. Obedience was inspired
3. Obedience was inclusive
4. Obedience was investigated

Imagine if you will, not having access to a Bible. Throughout history, that’s the way it’s been for most people. In the early church, the Bible consisted of the Greek translation of the Old Testament. It also included copies of all the letters that we now call the New Testament. As an apostle or a direct eye-witness of Jesus would write an inspired letter, the Spirit-led churches immediately recognized it. They immediately recognized it and included it in what would later be called the canon of Scripture. That continued to happen throughout the first century until around 90AD when the Apostle John wrote and distributed the Revelation. With that writing, Scripture was complete. It was complete, but it was also in demand. It was so much in demand that believers in the local churches would spend hours and hours writing their own copies by hand. We get bogged down by reading and memorizing Scripture. But these early believers copied Scripture word-for-word. There were thousands of these copies making their way through the churches. And then came the persecution. Not so much the Jewish persecution. They were content with just beating and killing Christians like James and Stephen. But the Roman persecution. The Romans saw how much the Christians valued their Scriptures. So not only did they kill the Christians. They confiscated and burned their scrolls and later on their books. But no amount of persecution could stop the spread of the written Word of God in the people’s language. That is, until Christianity became legal in 313AD. And then when it became the official religion of the Roman Empire in 323AD, things got much worse. Gradually, over the years, the Word of God was taken away from the people. The Catholic Church declared that the only legal Bible was a Latin translation called Jerome’s Vulgate. Well, that might be OK if anybody spoke Latin. But nobody did except the priests. Things got so bad that if anybody had a copy of the Bible in their own language, they were killed. Can you imagine living in that time? Living in a time where you knew that God had spoken to mankind and recorded His words in a Book. But you weren’t allowed to look at it. And even if you could sneak a peek at it—you wouldn’t understand it. Can you imagine how you would long to see God’s Word in your own language? How you would long to see His words yourself? To read them yourself. To understand them yourself. Then why don’t we have that same feeling now? We have free access to God’s Word. Most people are literate and for those who aren’t, the Bible is even available on tape. Why don’t we hunger for it? Why don’t we obey it? The remnant had gone for a long period of time without hearing the Word of the Lord. With the exception of Daniel in Babylon, the prophets had been silent since the exile. The remnant had quit the work on the temple. They had fallen for the lies of the opposition. They had given up. And God was silent. They had no purpose. They had no direction. And they had no temple. Once again, they were disobedient and God left them alone. They were without God’s Word and without God’s presence in His temple for 16 years. But then God broke the silence. He spoke. Just like always, God is the