Impact or Obedience

Just read The Divine Commodity by Skye Jethani and I thought I’d share a few thoughts this week, as they apply to the church we’re planting here in Vegas.

Jethani writes,

“What compelled Jesus was not impact but obedience. He was nourished by doing everything his Father commanded. ‘My food is to do the will of him who sent me,’ he said. Whether amid an adoring crowd entering Jerusalem, or isolated in the wilderness for forty days, Jesus’ single-minded obedience to his Father never wavered. His legitimacy did not come from the size of the crowd he impacted, but from the One who declared from heaven, ‘This is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased.’ With an identity anchored in his Father rather than his fans, Jesus was able to enage his mission and abandon the outcomes to God.”

This is a lesson God’s been teaching me, and I really hope I’ve learned it. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with wanting to make an impact. The problem is that it becomes our highest value, we can actually act in disobedient ways to increase our impact.

So, tell me, how have you struggled with this? And how has God been trying to teach you this lesson?