Learn practical ways to seek Him in the moment, deepen your faith, and experience God’s presence daily through simple, mindful steps.
Trevor H. Lund is the founder of Live LIGHT Academy at https://livelight.ca/ and the Creative Storyteller at https://revtrev.com Check out https://revtrev.com/tv for past videos and live casts and https://revtrev.com/radio to subscribe to his podcast wherever you listen.
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Today we’re talking about Walking in Obedience to the Risen Lord.
Why is it that every time we hear the word “Obey”, we instinctively want to rebel?
Tell me I’m not the only one.
I can’t be the only one to feel the need to push back or question anyone who tells me I need to obey?
Am I…?
I actually used that innate resistance when our kids were young to get them to do things.
I’d say, “You’re too small, you can’t do that.” Give them a challenge, say they can’t do it and they’ll prove you wrong.
Anyone with me on this? Come on, be honest. I’m not setting you up.
You’re not really looking forward to message on walking in obedience to the risen Lord because you know I can pull something out that you’re not doing and make you feel guilty for not obeying God in the way I say you need to.
When I saw this topic, I shook my head and rolled my eyes. I didn’t know how I was supposed to pull this off.
But the good news is, God reminded me of some things. And as I researched it, I got really, really excited.
Because I remembered the kind of God that God is and that obedience not what I instinctively thought it would be.
Let’s pray…
Let’s get excited about how God does things
We’re going to start with what Jesus told His disciples on the night He was betrayed.
John 14:15-21 “If you love me, obey my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, who will never leave you. He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. The world cannot receive him, because it isn’t looking for him and doesn’t recognize him. But you know him, because he lives with you now and later will be in you. No, I will not abandon you as orphans—I will come to you. Soon the world will no longer see me, but you will see me. Since I live, you also will live. When I am raised to life again, you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. Those who accept my commandments and obey them are the ones who love me. And because they love me, my Father will love them. And I will love them and reveal myself to each of them.”
Point one:
Obedience is our natural response to his supernatural love.
Because I love Him, I will naturally obey His commandments.
But what if they’re hard. Ah…they aren’t…
1 John 5:1-3 NLT Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has become a child of God. And everyone who loves the Father loves his children, too. We know we love God’s children if we love God and obey his commandments. Loving God means keeping his commandments, and his commandments are not burdensome.
That’s good to know. If all of us love God and love others—it’s easy to love people who love you. Now check out what else John tells us about those commandments…
1 John 4:19-21 NLT We love each other because he loved us first. If someone says, “I love God,” but hates a fellow believer, that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see? And he has given us this command: Those who love God must also love their fellow believers.
Remember:
Obedience is our natural response to his supernatural love.
Point two:
His supernatural love allows us to love each other.
I know I love God because I love other people. His commands are not burdensome because it’s easy when people already love me AND He empowers us to accomplish every good work prompted by faith. (2 Thessalonians 1:11)
Wait…there’s more… Jesus told us…
Matthew 22:37-40 NLT Jesus replied, “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: Love your neighbour as yourself. The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.“
Remember:
Obedience is our natural response to his supernatural love.
His supernatural love allows us to love each other.
Point three:
As we naturally respond to His love and love Him and love others we obey His commands.
Remember what perfect love is… Perfect love comes from God (1 John 4:8 …God is love.) And flows from us to others (1 John 4:19 We love because he first loved us.) It’s not something we work up in ourselves. It’s a response to love He has given us.
Do I need to make that clearer? Let’s go even earlier in 1 John.
1 John 4:7-12 Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins. Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other. No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us. (Made complete in us).
A few verses later he writes: Perfect love casts out all fear… 1 John 4:18
What does love look like when we seek Him?
And let’s not forget —how can you forget since I didn’t tell you—a chapter before he already wrote:
1 John 3:16-18 We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters. If someone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need but shows no compassion—how can God’s love be in that person? Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions.
Other translations say: let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.
Remember, He empowers us to accomplish every good work prompted by faith. (2 Thessalonians 1:11)
Also remember…
Obedience is our natural response to his supernatural love.
His supernatural love allows us to love each other.
As we naturally respond to His love and love Him and love others we obey His commands.
But there is a problem…
We need to remain in His love to love Him and love others with the love that comes from Him.
Look at what else Jesus tells us in John on the night he was betrayed.
John 15:5-17 NLT Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing. Anyone who does not remain in me is thrown away like a useless branch and withers. Such branches are gathered into a pile to be burned. But if you remain in me and my words remain in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted! When you produce much fruit, you are my true disciples. This brings great glory to my Father. I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow! This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me. You didn’t choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name. This is my command: Love each other.
Remember:
Obedience is our natural response to his supernatural love.
His supernatural love allows us to love each other.
As we naturally respond to His love and love Him and love others we obey His commands.
But… Point 4.
We will not remain in His love if we don’t obey what He empowers us to do.
When we don’t obey we lose our joy and hinder our producing of fruit.
He primes the pump by laying down his life for us and revealing his love personally to us.
We respond to this revelation by loving him more than our greatest love, our earliest love, our dearest love, and our nearest love. (Luke 14:26-27)
We love each other with the perfect love that comes from Him through us to each other. (1 John 4:18) He empowers us to accomplish every good work He’s already prompted us to do. (2 Thessalonians 1:11)
Seek Him and Remain in his Love and His Word
Our role is to remain in Him and have His spoken (Rhema ῥῆμα) word remain in us.
We get this in His presence. We get this by remaining in His love. It’s the very word of God, the very spoken word of God we need. He speaks as Holy Spirit illuminates the logos written word. You can read the word and not see Jesus, but when Holy Spirit illuminates the written word, the spoken word becomes real.
His voice should be clear when we read the word. But His voice is also clear in the gentle nudges we receive throughout the day. His sheep know His voice. As we obey the little nudges to call that friend you’ve been thinking of, or start a conversation with the person in front of you in the supermarket line—it’s like any spiritual disciple. The more you do use it, the more it grows and the less you use it the harder it goes.
As we obey the little nudges He gives entrusts us with more. When we don’t obey, we remove ourselves from His love and sometimes we can’t even feel his nudges until we stop and notice how longs it’s been.
You have been created to walk with God in the garden in the cool of the day. Do you know that you constantly need that connection with the nourishment of the vine. You know it’s true when you confess it’s been a while since you’ve felt and responded to his love and repent and do the things you did at first and respond to His love that has never left you. Nothing can separate you FROM his love. You can stop yourself from remaining IN His love.
We can’t love each other with the way he wants us to love each other without remaining in his love. Trust us. We’ve all experience serving people without the love of God and being served by someone who is not remaining in the love of God. We know what it looks like and feels like. Who has time for that?
What would it look it to seek Him and remain in His Love?
What would it look like to remain in His love?
This cannot be something you simply give mental assent to—an idea in our head or a sentiment in our heart. We need to work it out in the day-to-day of everyday? It has to be practical or else it is meaningless.
I mean I love that he loves me, but if it doesn’t make a difference in my life, I’m not responding to his grace. Don’t you want to say, “by the grace of God I am who I am and His grace to me was not without effect.” 1 Corinthians 15:10 And have the people closest to me agree with that. I want people to take note that I’ve been with Jesus without me having to point it out.
What would it feel like to seek Him and remain in His love?
What would it feel like to sense His pleasure on you and His joy over you—more and more—in the day-to-day of everyday?
I hope you know quiets you with His love and rejoices over you with singing. (Zephaniah 3:17)
You’ve heard me say it more than once…God is always with us—will you be with Him?
How can I seek Him and remain in His love?
How can you sense His pleasure on you and His joy over you—more and more—in the day-to-day of everyday?
That’s a great question.
Let me give you some tools to help.
I’ve made a tool of Ancient tools to help you SEE Him in the Moments.
They help you become more and more aware of Him. I’m not saying you have to do all of these at the same time. You can—it’s completely doable and they become enjoyable—but I don’t want to make you think you must.
I am saying if you want to seek God and find him, you need to seek Him with all of your heart. That includes your decision, your emotions and your actions. These tools are actions that help us seek him and find him when we seek him with all of our hearts.
S.E.E. Him in the Moments Tool
S — Stop with Statio Psalm 46:10
E — Echo Creation with Selah Psalm 119:164
E — Examine your day with Examen Psalm 16:7
S — Stop with Statio
Psalm 46:10 “Be still, and know that I am God! I will be honoured by every nation. I will be honoured throughout the world.”
Statio makes use of those time-between times. When you’re waiting for to pick up someone or waiting for a meeting to start.
Statio invites you to stop, stand still, and become aware of God’s presence in these liminal moments. It is a deliberate interruption of daily busyness to reflect, pray, or wait patiently. It helps you embrace uncertainty, waiting, and transformation instead of rushing through them.
Statio cultivates spiritual attentiveness and openness to God’s work during these “in-between” times.
Tips: Ask Holy to make you aware of His presence every day. Remind yourself to be aware of His Presence. Before your scroll mindlessly – STOP Thank God for his presence and experience His Love.
STOP
S- Stop what you’re doing for a minute or two
T – Take a few deep breaths
O – Observe and re-collect—recognize you with God in this moment
P – Pray a breath prayer of thanks or help
Breath prayer- “Help me be with you.”
Does God want me to connect with Him in the times between times?
E — Echo Creation with SELAH
Psalm 119:164 (NIV) “Seven times a day I praise you for your righteous laws.”
SELAH encourages you to pause intentionally and echo the praise of creation by praising God Psalm 19:1-2
This practice helps you live fully present in God’s presence, recognizing His goodness and power in every moment. It’s more than being aware of His presence, it’s responding to his presence with praise.
By echoing creation’s continual praise, you align your heart with God’s, making worship a constant rhythm rather than a rare event.
Tips – set a reminder. Block out space on your calendar. Set notifications to interrupt your day. Start with Gratitude to God for something—it effortlessly leads to praise.
SELAH
S – Stop. Be still and know He is God
E – Exhale. Take a few deep breaths and remember who God is and what He has done.
L – Look to see the beauty and blessing of God around you in the moment. Be curious.
A – Ask God to reveal something you need to hear, see or think
H – Hear what God says in the moment
Naturally show appreciation for what He shows you. – Praise Him!
Should I make space in my day to praise Him more often?
E — Examine your day with Examen
Psalm 16:7 I will bless the Lord who guides me; even at night my heart instructs me.
This practice, adapted from a tool used by Jesuit priests, helps you become aware of God’s presence throughout your day.
By honestly reviewing your experiences, you learn where you followed God and where you need growth.
Examen encourages daily self-awareness and spiritual growth through prayerful reflection.
Tips – make it part of your evening rhythm. Ie. Run through it as you brush your teeth.
Practice EXAMEN
- Be present – Centering prayer
- Be alert – Review the day for God’s presence – Was I with you?
- Be holy – use confession and repentance
- Be trustful- for grace and forgiveness and that he is working all this together for good
- Be mindful- reflect on tomorrow – How can I be with you?
- Be grateful- what do you want me to feel gratitude for today?
Does God want me to examine my day with Him?
How I got focussed on His Love
In my prayer time I came across this reflection and—even though I wrote it—I found it helped me evaluate where I want to be.
I love and serve God with my whole heart reflection
I love and serve God with my whole heart. I love the Lord my God with all my heart, all my soul, all my strength, and all my mind. I love my neighbour as myself.
I decide to love and serve Him. I choose to be patient and kind. I am not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. I do not demand my own way. I am not irritable, and I keep no record of being wronged. I do not rejoice about injustice but I rejoice whenever the truth wins out. I never give up, never lose faith, am always hopeful, and endure through every circumstance.
I love Him with my actions. I obey Jesus and keep His commandments. I remain in His love. His perfect love casts out all fear. I love others and His love is complete in me. The Father loves me and they have come and made their home with me.
I love Him with my emotions. I love God more than my greatest love, my earliest love, my dearest love, and my nearest love. I love because He first loved me. I do not love the world or the things of the world. I know that love of the world squeezes out love for the Father.
I have given up wanting my own way, wanting everything for myself, wanting to appear important. The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life have no rent-free space in my brain.
I have chosen and I show and I know that I love and serve God with my whole heart.
Reflection Question
Would others say I have been loving and serving God lately?
Conclusion
Matthew records the night Jesus was betrayed Matthew 26:20-25…all of them were greatly distressed and asked in turn “Am I the one Lord?” Judas didn’t call him Lord. He said “Teacher, am I the one?”
Who is Jesus to you?
Is he a good teacher or is he Lord of all? Is he Lord in the day-to-day of your everyday?
Will you make space to ask Holy Spirit how He wants you seek him and find him?
His spirit is calling you to seek him. Will you seek him with all of your heart?
These questions can help:
- Would others say I have been loving and serving God lately?
- Does God want me to connect with Him in the times between times?
- Should I make space in my day to praise Him more often?
- Does God want me to examine my day with Him?
Can I pray?
Ephesians 3:16-19 I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.
Lord reveal more of your love and help us remain more and more in your love. Amen
Explore More: Pages on Seeking the Lord
Find encouragement and practical helps across our site:
How to Align to Abide https://revtrev.com/livecasts/how-to-align-to-abide/
Seek the Lord LIVE! https://revtrev.com/living-light/seek-the-lord-and-live/
Experience hope and renewal by making seeking God a daily practice.
14 Ways to Seek the Lord https://revtrev.com/living-light/14-ways-to-seek-the-lord/
Do you know the ways the Bible tells us we can seek the Lord? Here are 14.
17 Reasons to Seek the Lord https://revtrev.com/living-light/17-reasons-to-seek-the-lord/
What are the reasons the Bible gives us to always be seeking the Lord? Find out 17.
What’s to BLAME when You Don’t Seek the Lord https://revtrev.com/living-light/whats-to-blame-when-you-dont-seek-the-lord/
We’re told to seek Him always, but what could be the reason that we don’t?
7 Things the Bible Says we can Seek the Lord For https://revtrev.com/living-light/7-things-the-bible-says-we-can-seek-the-lord-for/
Learn the 7 things the Bible says we can seek the Lord for.
Seek the Lord When No One is Watching https://revtrev.com/message/seek-the-lord-when-no-one-is-watching/
Discover the transformative power of seeking Him always, regardless of external circumstances.
Seek the Lord when you don’t know what to do https://revtrev.com/living-light/seek-the-lord-when-you-dont-know-what-to-do/
Learn how turning our hearts towards seeking the Lord can lead us towards clarity
Seek the Lord with Your Whole Heart https://revtrev.com/living-light/seek-the-lord-with-your-whole-heart/
Learn valuable lessons on true commitment and the perils of self-reliance.
40 Essential Bible Verses on Seeking the Lord with my whole heart https://revtrev.com/living-light/40-essential-bible-verses-on-seeking-the-lord-with-my-whole-heart/
See what the Bible says about seeking the Lord with all of our heart
42 Bible Verse on Seeking the Lord When you don’t know what to do https://revtrev.com/living-light/42-bible-verse-on-seeking-the-lord-when-you-dont-know-what-to-do/
Look at Bible Verses on
39 Amazing Bible Verses on Seeking the Lord https://revtrev.com/living-light/39-amazing-bible-verses-on-seeking-the-lord/
16 Reasons You Can Trust in the Lord with all Your Heart https://revtrev.com/living-light/16-reasons-you-can-trust-in-the-lord-with-all-your-heart/
Read stories and listen to teachings that inspire you to seek God every day.
7 Ways I Can Seek the Lord https://revtrev.com/live-intentional/how-i-can-seek-the-lord-7-ways/
Discover 7 ways to seek the Lord…since this post I’ve found 7 more. See Seek the Lord and Live! for 14 ways to seek the Lord
How Can We Seek the Lord? https://revtrev.com/live-light/how-can-we-seek-the-lord/
“I guess I always thought it meant “pray longer” maybe even “pray louder”. Of course it meant to fast…”
39 Amazing Bible Verses on Seeking the Lord https://revtrev.com/living-light/39-amazing-bible-verses-on-seeking-the-lord/
Find out what the Bible says about seeking the Lord
7 Benefits of Seeking the Lord https://revtrev.com/live-intentional/why-seek-the-lord-7-reasons/
There are a number of other benefits to following God’s command to seek Him
How to seek Him in the moment https://revtrev.com/livecasts/how-to-seek-him-in-the-moment/
Learn practical ways to seek Him in the moment, deepen your faith, and experience God’s presence daily through simple, mindful steps.
My heart says of You, “Seek His face!” reflection https://revtrev.com/livecasts/heart-reflection-livecast-my-heart-says-of-you-seek-his-face-reflection/
This heart reflection helps you to seek the Lord with all your heart.
This was beautiful Admin. Thank you for your reflections.
Thank you. Much appreciated.