Development in Creative Obedience

E. Stanley Jones was a missionary, a theologian, and a prolific writer. In his devotional book Victorious Living he points out the importance of actual obedience to the Lord Jesus and the games that are often played at His expense:

"When the disciples came in from a night-long, but fruitless, endeavor at their trade, Jesus said, 'Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets.' Peter in half-doubt, half-faith said, 'Master, we have toiled all night, and have taken nothing, nevertheless at thy word I will.'

"'At Thy word I will'--could fewer words sum up the Christian attitude? 'At Thy word'! That 'word,' speaking to men all through the ages, has never let men down. Whenever men have obeyed it, they have found they were upon an open road; where men have disobeyed it, they have found that they were running into roads with dead ends. That 'word' has been energy to the living and grace to the dying. Other words let me down--this 'word' does not. Nothing has been so utterly tested in history as Jesus' rightness, and nothing has proven itself so utterly right as His rightness.

"Then? This is the only thing left: 'At Thy word I will!' But many of us do not say that. We say: 'At Thy word I think.' We are intellectually aroused by Him, but not controlled by Him at the place of volition. We are mere intellectualists in religion. Or some of us say, 'At Thy word I feel.' We are moved with strong emotional responses to Him--sermons stir us, the reading of the gospel brings a thrill, but it does not get beyond that, it does not work itself into our wills. We are emotionalists in religion. But there are those who say, 'At Thy word I will.' They are the Christians. I am really growing as I grow at this point. This is the test of whether the gospel is functioning within me.

"Many of us are willing to do God's work, but not God's will. If so, the center remains unchristianized. I am Christian to the degree that Christ has my will. When you can say, 'At Thy word I will,' then you are really growing."