The Sin of Obedience

Obedience is an essential part of what it means to belong and is tied to the things we worship. We obey the rules of our tribal gods in order to keep our place in the tribe.

Not belonging is an awful business and so, under the threat of exclusion, we are prepared to make all kinds of compromises to keep our place in the tribe. Enter the sin of obedience. The willingness to disregard God and conscience and either obey or coerce others to obey indifferent, ungodly, or immoral instructions. A willingness to be enslaved in order to keep our seat among the cool kids (2 Corinthians 11:19-20).

The biblical word for this sin is idolatry: Acts of allegiance rendered to a foreign god. The evidence of our guilt is our attempt to dodge the charge, usually by claims of obedience. But,

Unquestioning obedience belongs to God, and God alone. Never to kings, rulers, employers, husbands, or parents. To render unquestioning obedience to these is sin. R.J. Rushdoony

A friend of mine, along with six co-workers, was fired from his job at a Sydney Christian school this week for not subjecting himself to a voluntary medical experiment.

The memo from the school principal read,

Due to circumstances totally beyond the School’s control, and despite our best efforts…

The above is a species of, “the devil made me do it” and is as old as Adam.

But that, along with cries of, “I was just doing my job” or, “The old man told me to” (1 Kings 13:11-24), didn’t work for German nurses in the 1940s, is seen for what it is by godly and honourable men, and won’t work before the courts of heaven.

Far from evading responsibility, statements like the one above are more like an admission of guilt. The letter of dismissal implied that the decision was being made with regret. But if your decision to rob a man of his means of existence are regrettable, then why do you go ahead and rob him?

Why not suffer with him? Why all this regret? Because you knew it was unjust and you preferred that he suffer, rather than you. You wanted to keep your place among the cool kids because those kids (or money, or acceptance, or reputation) are the neighbours you love.

There is no regret in godly choices.

For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death. (2 Corinthians 7:10)

I dislike having to discipline my son, but I don’t regret it. But regret in the instance cited above, is the result of the sin of obedience to a foreign god. It’s the result of a defiled conscience. And the guilt is personal.

The state (an abstraction) has not come to me in contradiction to the commandments of God and said that singing in church is forbidden. You did that at the church door. The state has not come to me and said, “you’re fired”. You did that with an email. The state has not issued a fine for being more than 5km from home, you did that when I was en-route to visit a dying friend. And the state will not stand before the courts of heaven and give an account before the God of all creation. You’ll do that, not many days from now.

You may or may not agree with the current edicts being drummed up by our resident overlords. That’s largely a matter of conscience and biblical discernment. But when you begin to mandate those edicts on others, or go against your own conscience and obey for the sake of tribal loyalties, then it’s a matter of sin. It’s the sin of obedience and a public admission as to who you truly serve and what you truly worship.