Radical Obedience: The Secrets Of Surrender And A Real Lived-Out Love For God

By Crandell

Millions of Christians long for a faith that isn't just theoretical or emotional, but translates into real-life demonstrations of God's direction, protection, and provision. They want the ki

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jeremiah House Publishing
• Release date: Mar 23, 2024
• ISBN: 9781989066089

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Radical Obedience

The Secrets Of Surrender And A Real Lived-Out Love For God

By Toyin Crandell

Toronto, Ontario

Copyright © 2023 by Toyin Crandell.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without prior written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For more information, contact Jeremiah House Publishing, PO Box 446, Beaverton, ON, L0K1A0, Canada

Published in Toronto, Ontario, Canada by Jeremiah House Publishing.

Unless otherwise noted, all scripture quotations are from the New American Standard Bible, copyright 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977 by the Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

Scripture quotations marked NKJV are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission.

Scriptures marked ESV are taken from the Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV): Copyright© 2001 by Crossway, of Good News Publishers. Used by permission.

Any italicization or words in brackets added to scripture quotations are the author’s addition for emphasis or clarity.

Organizations, churches, pastors and small group leaders can receive special discounts when purchasing this book and other Jeremiah House Publishing resources. For more information, please email [e-mail]

Crandell, Toyin, 1988-, author

Radical Obedience: The Secrets Of Surrender And A Real Lived-Out Love For God / Toyin Crandell.

ISBN 978-1-989066-07-2 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-989066-10-2 (Hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-989066-09-6 (Audiobook)

ISBN 978-1-989066-08-9 (Electronic)

Religion & Spirituality: Christian Living: Leadership & Mentoring

Religion & Spirituality: Christian Living: Calling & Vocation

DISCLAIMER AND LIMIT OF LIABILITY: While anyone may find the teachings, practices, disciplines, techniques, examples, and anecdotes in this book to be useful, this book is sold with the understanding that neither the author, nor Toyin Crandell Coaching are engaged in presenting any specific financial, tax, career, legal, psychological, emotional, or health advice. Nor is anything in this book an analysis, recommendation, solution, diagnosis, prognosis, or cure for any specific career, financial, psychological, emotional, or health circumstance or problem. Every person has unique needs and circumstances and this book does not take those individual needs and circumstances into account. Any person experiencing financial or career concerns, or any anxiety, depression, stress, health, or relationship issues, should consult with a financial or tax advisor, career counselor, medical doctor, licensed psychologist, licensed therapist, or other appropriate qualified professional before commencing any new financial plan or transaction, career strategy, change in personal relationships, exercise program, or following any of the teachings, methods, and suggestions described in this book. This book is not a substitute for the reader enlisting qualified professionals to assist with the reader’s specific circumstances, issues and problems.

Printed In Canada

PO Box 446, Beaverton, ON, L0K1A0, Canada

Table of Contents

Copyright

Dedication

Prelude

PART 1: The Foundation For Obedience

Chapter 1: Why Obedience Matters

Chapter 2: From Bored to Branded

Chapter 3: Why We Do Not Obey (even if you desperately want to)

PART 2: How To Obey

Chapter 4: Building Habits of Obedience

Chapter 5: Hearing The Voice of God

Chapter 6: Timing Is Everything

Chapter 7: Learning To Trust God

Chapter 8: Falling Face First

Chapter 9: Questions In The Fire

PART 3: Either Way You Win!

Chapter 10: Holy Spirit - Your Wild Card

Chapter 11: Passion. Purpose. What Being Alive Feels Like

Surprise!

Conclusion

Acknowledgements

DEDICATION

I dedicate this book to my children — Maranatha, Nehemiah and Esperanza.

You are my motivation for completing and releasing this book. If I have taught you anything with my life, it doesn’t compare with my desire that you understand this:

Jesus is worthy of your Yes. He is worthy of your ALL.

Everything this world has to offer you pales in comparison to the knowledge that you walk with Him, hear His voice and follow closely.

That is my highest prayer for you.

Prelude

You may have heard stories of people who obeyed God by travelling to the unknown corners of the earth to share the gospel. People who started large crusade movements, changing millions of lives for Christ. You may even have heard of those who pastor churches the size of cities.

But this book, will take you on the journey of obedience to God, right where you are. It will charge, convict and equip you to live in obedience to Jesus, wherever you are right now, whether that’s in North or South America, Africa, Asia, Australia or elsewhere.

This book itself is evidence of learned obedience.

You see, while I have walked with God for over a decade in joyful obedience, I felt that I did not know enough to write on the subject of obeying God. In fact, when He charged me to do so, I chickened out. I had always done my best to do most of the things He asked, but this one challenged me to my core.

And it’s not because I didn’t want to write it.

The subject was too dear to my heart. Now, all of a sudden, the desire to be perfect in each word, each stroke of my pen, to not misspeak or mislead, led me to a standstill.

I’d written a best-selling book Money Mindset SHIFT. Church Edition: The Top 9 Myths That Keep Christians Stuck Financially and How To Get Unstuck, Live Debt Free and Build Wealth! I had ghostwritten best-sellers for other authors. I even was the CEO of a self-publishing company, and I still couldn’t imagine where to start with this book.

So, I sat on the idea for 6 years. It wasn’t until I felt the Holy Spirit warn me that I would miss a major assignment for my life if this book was not completed. That pushed me to take courage and begin the process.

However, I made another error.

I’m sure you’re wondering why I would start a book about obedience with the mistakes I made. But I promise you, stick with me and you’ll understand.

Now, back to my error. When I finally decided to start this book, instead of writing it myself, I chose to invest money into getting it ghostwritten. It was so precious to me that I didn’t want to say anything the wrong way. However, what I was really saying was that this message was too important for my voice, as is. I figured there was a professional out there that could make it sound the way it needed to for the largest viewership possible. So as soon as I could, I saved up about $65,000 USD to get the best of the best.

When God Hinders You

We kicked off the project and everything that could happen, did. This was not the fault of the company I hired. We moved homes, had a baby, ran for political office as a family, and my company had massive moments of transition and growth. Now, this book that was supposed to be  written within 5 - 6 months, started to take longer and longer. Before I knew it, 2 years had gone by.

Something else was happening with the book. I stopped feeling like it carried the anointing of the message God had given me, and I didn’t understand why. I would hesitate each time I worked on the book and it felt like writer’s block. I would procrastinate on our writing meetings. And even when I sat with the book, it felt like I had nothing to say.

I couldn’t work on it. I didn’t know what to do. I had no clue why I had lost all zeal for this message that I KNEW was a foundational part of what God had called me to do.

Technically, at this point, the book was written —all 450 pages of it,120,000 words. It was long, it was bulky, and it was not anointed.

At first, I figured I simply needed to cut it down to 300 pages and about 80,000 words, but I had no idea where to start and what to cut or keep. I chalked it up to an editing problem. But I had edited numerous other books. Why was this so different?

I thought it was a time management problem. I tried scheduling accountability sessions. I tried time blocking for focus. As a matter of fact, I already knew how to manage my time as a homeschooling mom of 2 with a multi-million dollar organization. Time management couldn’t be the issue. This felt deeper than that. So what was it?!

I posted about the book, getting insight from hundreds of people on the cover, the title and everything else. But I couldn’t bring myself to move forward with any of it.

Two years had passed and this book still wasn’t done. I finally emailed the company to let them know I was ready to make it my full-time focus, rain or shine. I would push through, even if it didn’t feel like there was a grace on it.

And then I got the news. This company that was world renown (not an exaggeration) for publishing international New York Times and Wall Street Journal Bestsellers had gone bankrupt — with my book in their cue.

This meant that everyone I was working with had been fired. My book was immediately halted. I would need to pay an exorbitant amount in order to continue working with the new owners of the company.

In other words, that was the end.

But it couldn’t be.

A Fresh Start

So I took full ownership of the journey, again.

I made the decision that the book would be completely written before the end of that year.

I prayed and asked God for help and mercy. I wanted to know what had been holding this book back, and exactly what I needed to do to finish it.

In this place of desperate prayer, He led me to an event where I had the opportunity to spend time with John Maxwell’s writer – Charlie Wetzel, and his wife, Stephanie. Wetzel partnered with Maxwell to write over 100 books in the last 30 years.

They spent 10 minutes speaking to me about this book on a bus ride to an event. They helped me to see two things: first, that the message of the book had changed from its original audience and intent, to now trying to speak to those it was not intended for. Secondly, that trying to please the experts I had partnered with had watered down the message, and caused me to lose the fire I initially had. They suggested I remember my first audience, and my first message, and cut out whatever was inserted outside of that place of inspiration.

A Fire Rekindled

I got home from that event and finally heard God speak about the book.

He said, Rewrite the book.

Now technically, I had heard God say that numerous times over the 2 years. But I didn’t believe He actually meant to scrap all the work we had already done.

All the money I had invested.

And rewrite the book from scratch.

That same week, I saw a quote I had posted on social media 7 years ago come back up on my feed; thank you Facebook Memories. It was a quote from Bill Bright. It said, When God gives a man a vision, he is never to delegate it to someone else. And all of a sudden it clicked.

When God gave me this vision, He asked me to write from the intimate place of my journey of obedience — a journey which has caused thousands of people to want to love Jesus and passionately obey Him. I cared so much about it sounding the right way, that I decided to put money where my voice was supposed to be and delegated the task. While delegation is great, in this case, God did not tell me to give it to a company to write. I did that because of fear.

I was afraid that if I told this story myself, it would not reach the people who are praying for a breakthrough in this area. I was convinced that the only way this book could be a potential New York Times Bestseller was if a better writer took the lead.

And this fear and insecurity caused me to give my voice away.

I repented immediately.

I picked up my laptop, looked at the tab that had been open on my computer for years–you know those I’ll get to this soon tabs–with the 120,000 word document I had been slaving over for years – and I closed it.

I opened up a blank page and allowed Jesus to speak to and through me, to you.

So welcome. Come in and take a seat. If you are ready to experience a life of faith, love and the type of obedience that proves that the God of the Bible is still alive, then this book will be one you read again, year after year. Your life can display the type of obedience that causes your grandchildren or friends around the Thanksgiving table, to ask for more stories about your history in pursuing Jesus, and seeing Him show up in your everyday setting.

This book will teach you:

How to make mistakes, dust yourself off and keep running the race of faith, over and over again.

How to receive the love of God even when you feel the least deserving of it.

How to walk with clarity of mind and purpose even when things are going crazy around you.

How to win BIGat the things God calls you to do.

How to know that you are living a life of radical obedience, motivated by love instead of fear.

This book will teach you how to trust that the One who has called you, is faithful to assist you in doing what He has called you to do. Share this book with those who pursue the Lord with you. The sharper your community is in obedience, the sharper you become.

PART

1

THE FOUNDATION FOR OBEDIENCE

Chapter 1:

WHY OBEDIENCE MATTERS

O

bedience, in my experience, is one of the most discussed topics in Christian circles. We have full-length Bible studies and sermons on it. We can share dissertations, with verse-by-verse recitation.

And it feels absolutely glorious – until you encounter something you don’t want to do, or feel stuck because you aren’t clear about what God wants you to do in a certain season. Or imagine that, you finally step out in what you feel God said to do, and you’re met with huge backlash and criticism. Even worse, you step out and you are met with nothing. No big positive, no big negative, just nothing.

Obedience is an easier said than done conversation.

Many of us start our walk with God in a place of absolute surrender; God have every part of me! We sing the songs and pray the prayers, but over the years, a disillusionment sets in. We faced disappointments. We felt the pushback. For some of us, we have gotten distracted. We’re comfortable, complacent, and we’ve settled into the Western Sunday-to-Sunday version of Christianity we swore to never settle for.

Meanwhile, your heart is crying out there has to be more.

And God calls you to this more because obedience is not an option. It is part of the foundation of a healthy, honest relationship with Him.

Obedience is part of the foundation of a healthy, honest relationship with God.

God’s Love Language

In John 15, Jesus gives us a beautiful picture of relationship with Him: I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. It is an image of connection, love, and fruitfulness—one where we are desperately dependent on God and we grow in His love because we are intertwined with Him. It’s a beautiful display of His perspective of our relationship.  Later, in this conversation Jesus gives the disciples the secret to His heart. He sums up what it means to show Him friendship and love. He says, "...You are My friends if you do what I command you."¹

Obedience is God’s love language.

You may have heard about the five Love Languages by Gary Chapman. They are a list of ways we receive and express love to one another. They include things like physical touch, quality time, words of affirmation, etc. Many of us want to show God that we love Him in our way by singing worship songs, attending a church, reading the Bible and so on.  Yet, Jesus made God’s love language clear and most people miss it.

It’s radical obedience.

This is emphasized throughout scripture:

"My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in action and in truth."²

"If you love me, you will keep my commandments."³

"But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves."⁴

And Samuel said, Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams."⁵

Jesus answered him, If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him."⁶

"Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you?"⁷

There’s a difference between simply reading the Bible and praying, versus having a life surrendered to His leadership.

Once, while driving downtown to minister, my team and I started talking about the fact that we sing so many songs to God that we aren’t willing to back up. We sing words like, Take everything away till all I have is you, or, I wanna be tried by fire, purified. You take whatever you desire, Lord here’s my life, but don’t really mean it. We don’t want to be tried by His purifying fire. We don’t want him to take everything away. We want our comfort and Jesus in a box with a neatly tied bow on top.

We were so marked by this conversation that we started to pray and ask God for the grace to live out the song lyrics we sing. Being musicians, we ended up singing the prayer and it turned into a song called, In the Name of Love, which is on our album Living out Love. In it, we sing these words:

"Give us the grace to live out what we sing, living only for our King, that You would grant the strength to carry Your glory. Love is not just words, but it’s action and deeds. This is what You said, that if we love You we would cleave, to Your commands, to Your direction.

We’ll follow Your plan, we’ll go the distance."

This is God’s love language.

It’s our actions that tell God, I hear you, Abba (this is the Aramaic word for father, and another name I use interchangeably with God). I’m with you. I love you. I want more of you. So I choose to do what You’re telling me to do.

Throughout the Bible, God says in different forms, I love you and I have given much for you. Will you love me in return? And when Abraham, Moses, Mary, or Peter responded, Yes, Lord—I love you—the Lord’s response was almost always a direction to act:

Take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell you.⁸

Feed my sheep⁹.

"Now the Lord spoke to Moses in the Wilderness of Sinai…Thus the children of Israel did; according to all that the Lord commanded Moses, so they did.¹⁰

And it’s reciprocal. When Moses requested to see God’s face, He responded, "I will also do this thing of which you have spoken; for you have found favor in My sight and I have known you by name."¹¹ God said to Moses, I will do what you’ve asked because I love you.

Obedience is Better Than Sacrifice

Obedience matters to God; Doing what He says, when He says to do it. When King Saul was given a commission to destroy the Amalekites completely, this was his assignment:

"This is what the Lord of armies says: ‘I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel, in that he obstructed him on the way while he was coming up from Egypt. Now go and strike Amalek and completely destroy everything that he has, and do not spare him; but put to death both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.’"¹²

God was very clear in His directive to Saul, yet, Saul decided to follow some but not all of His direction. He went 90% of the way; and incomplete obedience is