Meditations about obedience
By Vali Archip
I find it difficult to write about obedience because each time I reflect upon it, I bring myself into a position I don’t want to be in. It is painful to be in a position where my egoism is revealed and in which I am asked to crucify my earthly nature — a position in which I am more aware of who God is and what my identity is in Christ (Gal. 5:24).
Recently I had a challenging discussion with the children from Casa “La Vale” (“Valley” House). As we were preparing to start a new school year, we began talking about the negative ways (violence, vulgarity, rebellion) the children behave when they aren’t with us. So I asked one of them, “How do you think this new school year will be? Do you think you will do better?” But because this child wanted to be the center of attention and to feel in control, he answered me with sarcasm: “It’s going to be better.” This year at camp we had discussions about this same issue with the older children, that they behave in a nicer way when they are at Casa “La Vale,” but they act quite differently when they are with their friends, with their families, at school or somewhere else.
I pointed out that it is a dysfunction, a kind of disease, when someone doesn’t have consistent behavior. More than that, this kind of behavior can be called “double-dealing.” Someone else has named it “form without content.” Anyway, my answer regarding this double-dealing attitude was a bit too harsh toward the children: “We expect you to behave just like you say. And we want to see it and praise you for it. And if you say that it can’t be done, my conclusion is that you don’t have the courage to behave without being violent or vulgar.”
The next day my thoughts went even further, identifying myself with this type of behavior. I also lack the courage to be different from the group. I lack the courage to desire to please to God when I am in public. Those thoughts and questions created even more questions and thoughts: How can you have the courage to obey God in this world that worships the powerful, the best in violence and politics? How can you have the courage to be different in a context where you win significance and a feeling of belonging through violence, vulgarity and conformity to the group? To be different means exclusion from the group. It means to be alone and weird.
On top of that, how can you be different if you come from a dysfunctional-family background (like many of my young friends), such as having alcoholic parents who cast their children to the streets, violent parents with vulgar language, parents who exploit their children and the whole family, or parents who abandon or deny their children? If our friends don’t learn morals from their own family, what would inspire them to act morally if it is in opposition to the ways their friends act?
As we come closer to God, we are able to recognize an innate desire to obey God, even if that obedience leads us to noncomformity with our friends. We obey God because He is sovereign, because He is God.1
This same sovereignty asks us to love God more than anything else. But how can I love God the most if I don’t know Him? The people who are next to me are dear to me, and when they love me, won’t I love them even more? That is why, first of all, God calls us to intimacy. We cannot obey God if we don’t answer this call for intimacy. What we cannot see or recognize is that we were created for God. So we can pray to regain the natural way of obeying God, which is lost for us now, yet springs from our intimacy with Him in the “cool of the day” (Gen. 3:8), through which God can be recognized easily as sovereign, even in our broken world.
ENDNOTES
1 C. S. Lewis, Surprins de bucurie, ed. Humanitas, Bucureşti, p. 248.
Valerica “Vali” Archip is the director of Casa “La Vale,” (pictured with husband Lau). At the center, she can be found doing everything from boxing up Christmas presents to meeting with parents. She has a passion for learning and loves jigsaw puzzles, C.S. Lewis’ writings, and traveling to new places.