As the father of four adult children, I can testify to the fact that the transition from the late teenage years to their early adulthood was one of the most complicated transitions our family has had to navigate.
That’s a season when, as a parent, you begin relaxing your role of authority. Instead of insisting that they do or don’t do certain things, you begin encouraging them to make wise choices based on the foundation you offered them when they were being raised.
And the further they move into their adult years, the less you volunteer that kind of encouragement without being asked for it first.
It’s hard to relinquish authority. It’s also hard to submit to authority. That’s a struggle we’ve all experienced in just about every season of life. I frequently joke with my father that I must have been a “piece of cake” to raise during my younger years.
He and I both know how comical that statement is because I often challenged his authority while he was trying to give me good counsel during my formative seasons.
Accepting counsel and respecting the authority of our parents and other leaders can be a challenge because of our sin nature. By nature, we have a rebellious streak. We want to call the shots.
We want to be our own governing authority. We want life to operate on our timetable and according to our rules. That defiant spirit shows up in many areas of life including our walk with Christ.
When Jesus was carrying out His earthly ministry, He spent much of that ministry teaching. The Gospel of Mark tells us that people were amazed at the way Jesus spoke because there was authority in His words.
And not only did His words carry authority, but His actions also demonstrated His authority over illness, infirmity, and demonic forces.
And they were all amazed, so that they questioned among themselves, saying, “What is this? A new teaching with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.” And at once his fame spread everywhere throughout all the surrounding region of Galilee (Mark 1:27-28).
Because Jesus, our Lord and Savior, is the authority He is, and because the demonstration of His authority is made abundantly clear in Scripture, we’re called to respect and obey Him.
As members of the church of which He is the divinely ordained head, we’re directed to submit ourselves to His leadership. That makes sense theologically, but we frequently struggle to live this out in a practical sense because of our penchant for rebellion.
Do you desire to honor Christ’s authority? Would you like to live a life that begins showing Him the respect He truly deserves? If so, let me suggest a few simple ways we can joyfully demonstrate our respect for the authority of Jesus in our lives.
One of Satan’s favorite tactics is to attempt to undermine the Lord’s authority by encouraging us to question the plain meaning of Scripture (Genesis 3:1).
When we drift from trusting the counsel of God’s Word, however, we’ll end up veering toward an over-reliance on our own wisdom or the faulty wisdom of this world.
On the other hand, when we trust the counsel in God’s Word, we’ll put it into practice in our day-to-day lives and more readily obey what He has inspired to be written and revealed.
It takes humility to admit that we don’t know everything. We don’t usually like to be corrected or proven wrong, but the Lord (in His mercy) will often challenge our limited wisdom.
Through the presence of the Holy Spirit who lives within us, we’re granted counsel and guidance (John 14:26), but we’re less likely to listen to His counsel if we won’t first admit that there are limits to what we already know.
Through Jesus, we’ve been granted an entirely new way of thinking and living (1 Corinthians 2:16). There were ideas and practices that we used to embrace in the past, but as we continue walking with the Lord, He convicts our hearts and helps us see that many of the things we once embraced were unhealthy and were leading us in an unhealthy and unfruitful direction.
When we choose to submit to Christ’s authority and walk in the direction of His leading, we will need to embrace repentance to do that well because He will show us a new course that will cause us to forsake the mindset and behaviors that we used to tolerate in our lives.
There may have been a season of your life when you thought of Jesus as an “option” or as a “part of your life,” but if you really want to respect His authority, it’s time to go “all in.” It’s time to submit every area of yourself to His guidance and oversight (John 8:12).
Don’t hold anything back because whatever we hold back from Him becomes an idol in our lives that attempts to rob Him of the authority He deserves.
Learning to respect the authority of Jesus is a life-long process for all believers. As our faith in Jesus develops and matures, and as we learn to value the counsel of His Word, our understanding of the value of submitting to His compassionate and loving authority grows. Welcome the protective care and direction of the Savior of the world. You won’t regret it.
For further reading:
What Does the Bible Say about the Authority of Believers?
What Did Jesus Mean by ‘I Have Given You Authority to Trample on Snakes’?
3 Ways to Embrace Your True Identity in Christ
Jesus Is Not Who We Think He Is
Why Should We Take Jesus' Yoke Upon Ourselves?
Photo Credit: ©iStock/Getty Images Plus/camaralenta
John Stange is the Lead Pastor at Core Creek Community Church and a professor at Cairn University where he leads the Digital Media and Communication program. He also leads an online community called Platform Launchers where he helps people build message-based online platforms.
John has authored over 30 books and presently hosts several podcasts on the LifeAudio podcast network. His shows have been downloaded millions of times by listeners throughout the world.
You can learn more about John’s ministry, books, and podcasts at BibleStudyHeadquarters.com.