The School of Obedience: If ye love me, keep my commandments – John 14:15

By Andrew Murray

If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love, even as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. – John 15:10

God will not honor the person who is not obedient.

For us to have favor with God, obedience is of utmost importance. To obey is better than sacrifice (1 Samuel 15:22). This is evident from the very beginning of the Bible to the very end: Blessed are they that do His commandments, that they may have a right to the tree of life (Revelation 22:14).

From Paradise lost to Paradise regained, the necessity for obedience remains the same. It is only obedience that restores access to the tree of life and favor with God. While the original disobedience was the cause of humanity's fall, through the obedience of Christ to the Father, and through our obedience to Christ, we can once again be restored. Although he was the Son of God, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered; and being made perfect, he became the author of eternal saving health unto all those that hearken unto him (Hebrews 5:8-9).

Let this study awaken in you an earnest desire to fully know God’s will concerning this truth. Let us unite in praying that the Holy Spirit will show us how defective the Christian’s life is in which obedience does not rule everything. Let us desire to learn how that life can be exchanged for one of full surrender to absolute obedience, and how certain it is that God, through Christ, will enable us to live it out.

List of Chapters
Obedience – What Bible Says About It
The Obedience of Christ
Obtaining the Desire to Obey
Preparing to Obey
Intentional Obedience
Obedience and Faith
Willing Obedience
Obedience to the Great Commission

About the Author
Andrew Murray (1828-1917) was a well-known South African writer, teacher, and pastor. More than two million copies of his books have been sold, and his name is mentioned among other great leaders of the past, such as Charles Spurgeon, T. Austin-Sparks, George Muller, D. L. Moody, and more.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Aneko Press
• Release date: Apr 1, 2019
• ISBN: 9781622455348

Andrew Murray

ANDREW MURRAY (1828-1917) was a church leader, evangelist, and missionary statesman. As a young man, Murray wanted to be a minister, but it was a career choice rather than an act of faith. Not until he had finished his general studies and begun his theological training in the Netherlands, did he experience a conversion of heart. Sixty years of ministry in the Dutch Reformed Church of South Africa, more than 200 books and tracts on Christian spirituality and ministry, extensive social work, and the founding of educational institutions were some of the outward signs of the inward grace that Murray experienced by continually casting himself on Christ. A few of his books include The True Vine, Absolute Surrender, The School of Obedience, Waiting on God, and The Prayer Life.

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The School of Obedience

Andrew Murray

Contents

Preface

Ch. 1: Obedience – What the Bible Says About It

Ch. 2: The Obedience of Christ

Ch. 3: Obtaining the Desire to Obey

Ch. 4: Preparing to Obey

Ch. 5: Intentional Obedience

Ch. 6: Obedience and Faith

Ch. 7: Willing Obedience

Ch. 8: Obedience to the Great Commission

Note Regarding the Morning Watch

Man’s Questions; God’s Answers

Andrew Murray – A Brief Biography

This book is prayerfully dedicated to the members of the Students’ Christian Association of South Africa and all Christian students throughout the world.

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Preface

These addresses on obedience are published with the very fervent prayer that our gracious Father will use them for the instruction and strengthening of the young men and women on whose obedience and devotion so much depends for the church and the world. To all who read this, I send my loving greeting. May the God of all grace bless you abundantly!

It often happens after a conference, or even after writing a book, that only then do we begin to see the meaning and importance of the truth with which we have been occupied. I feel as if I had utterly failed to grasp or expound the spiritual character, the completely indispensable necessity, the divine and actual possibility, and the inconceivable blessedness of a life of true and entire obedience to our Father in heaven. Let me, therefore, in a few sentences, summarize the main points which have come home to me with special power, asking every reader to take note of them as some of the main lessons to be learned in Christ’s school of obedience.

The Father in heaven asks, requires, and expects all of His children to give Him wholehearted and entire obedience all day long, every single day.

To enable His children to do this, He has made a most abundant and entirely sufficient provision in the promise of the New Covenant and in the gift of His Son and Spirit. This provision can only be enjoyed and these promises fulfilled in the soul that gives itself up to live in abiding communion with the Three-in-One God so that His presence and power work in it all day long.

The very entrance into this life demands the vow of absolute obedience – or the surrender of the whole self – to be, think, speak, and do every moment nothing except what is according to the will of God and is well-pleasing to Him.

If these things are indeed true, it is not enough to agree that they are true. We need the Holy Spirit to give us such a vision of their glory and divine power and the demand they make on our immediate and unconditional submission that there may be no rest until we accept all that God is willing to do for us.

Let us all pray that God, by the light of His Spirit, will so show His loving and almighty will concerning us that it will be impossible for us to be disobedient to the heavenly vision.

Andrew Murray

Wellington, August 9, 1898

Chapter 1

Obedience – What the Bible Says About It

In studying a Bible word or a truth of the Christian life, it is very beneficial to take a survey of the place it has in Scripture. When we see where, how often, and in what connection it is found, its relative importance can be understood, as well as its importance on the entire Word of God. Let me try in this first chapter to prepare the way for the study of what obedience is by showing you where to go in God’s Word to find the mind of God concerning it.

Take Scripture as a Whole

We begin with Paradise, or the garden of Eden. In Genesis 2:16 we read, And the Lord God commanded the man, saying. And later, in Genesis 3:11, Hast thou eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee not to eat? Note how obedience to the command is the one virtue of Paradise, the one condition of man’s abiding there, the one thing his Creator asks of him. Nothing is said of faith, humility, or love; obedience includes all that. The claim and authority of God are great, and so is the demand for obedience as the one thing that is to decide your destiny.

In the life of man, to obey is the one great thing needed. To obey is better than sacrifice (1 Samuel 15:22).

Turn now from the beginning to the end of the Bible. In the last chapter, in Revelation 22:14, you read, Blessed are they that do His commandments, that they may have a right to the tree of life. We have the same thought in chapters 12 and 14, where we read of the seed of the woman, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ (Revelation 12:17), and of the patience of the saints: Here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus (Revelation 14:12).

From beginning to end, from Paradise lost to Paradise regained, the law is unchangeable. It is only obedience that gives access to the tree of life and the favor of God. If you ask how the change was made from the disobedience at the beginning of history that closed the way to the tree of life, to the obedience at the end that again gained entrance to it, turn to that which stands midway between the beginning and the end – the cross of Christ.

Read a passage like Romans 5:19: By the obedience of one shall many be made righteous; or Philippians 2:8-9: He humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him; or Hebrews 5:8-9: Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered; And being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him – and you see how the whole redemption of Christ consists in restoring obedience to its place.

The beauty of His salvation consists in this – that He brings us back to the life of obedience, through which alone those who were created can give the Creator the glory due to Him, and through which he can receive the glory that his Creator desires him to take part in.

Paradise, Calvary, and heaven all proclaim with one voice, Child of God! The first and the last thing your God asks of you is simple, universal, and unchanging obedience.

Let Us Turn to the Old Testament

Here let us especially notice that with any new beginning in the history of God’s kingdom, obedience always comes into special prominence.

Look at Noah, the new father of the human race, and you will find it written four times that Noah obeyed.

According to all that God commanded [Noah], so did he. (Genesis 6:22)

Noah did according unto all that the Lord commanded him. (Genesis 7:5)

There went in two and two unto Noah into the ark, the male and the female, as God had commanded Noah. (Genesis 7:9)

And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God had commanded him. (Genesis 7:16)

It is the person who does what God commands, to whom God can entrust His work, whom God can use to save others.

Think of Abraham, the father of the chosen race. By faith Abraham . . . obeyed (Hebrews 11:8).

When Abraham had been forty years in this school of faith and obedience, God came to perfect his faith and to crown it with His fullest blessing. Nothing could fully qualify him for this except a crowning act of obedience.

After Abraham had bound his son on the altar, God came and said, By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord, . . . in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed . . . and in thy seed shall all nations be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice (Genesis 22:16-18).

And to Isaac He said, I will perform the oath which I swore unto Abraham . . . because that Abraham obeyed my voice (Genesis 26:3, 5).

Oh, when will we learn how unspeakably