Jesus was speaking to His disciples. He said, "All things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you." This doesn't describe His "intent" for His followers; instead, it simply says Jesus made known to them everything He heard from His Father. It refers to content not intent.

Yes, this applies to everyone today who understands and obeys and observes everything Jesus commanded. People like this, people in this state, have attained unto the sinlessness Adam enjoyed in Eden. Listen:

Those only who through faith in Christ obey all of God's commandments will reach the condition of sinlessness in which Adam lived before his transgression. They testify to their love of Christ by obeying all His precepts (MS 122, 1901). {6BC 1118.10}

When enlightened by the Spirit of God, the believer beholds the perfection of Jesus, and beholding this perfection, he rejoices with joy unspeakable. In self he sees sin and helplessness; in the Redeemer [he sees] sinlessness and infinite power. The sacrifice that Christ made in order that He might impart to us His righteousness--this is a theme upon which we may dwell with deeper and still deeper enthusiasm. {SD 124.2}

Matthew
28:18 And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.
28:19 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:
28:20 Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, [even] unto the end of the world. Amen.

The intent is that we be not servants but friends. God does not desire a slavish obedience, but desires that we have an intelligent appreciation of His attributes of character, and that our obedience spring from that appreciation.

True, but He also requires obedience even when we do not understand why. God does not require obedience on condition we understand why.

I don't see how your suggestion here can be the case, MM, because God does not desire a slavish obedience:



If what you are suggesting were the case, then it would not be true that God takes no pleasure in a slavish obedience, because requiring obedience without understanding would be requiring slavish obedience.

Slavish obedience = Obedience without understanding

I disagree.

Slavish obedience = grudgingly obeying God

"He would have them obey Him because they have an intelligent appreciation of His wisdom, justice, and benevolence." Not because they understand all the reasons why He requires them to obey Him in this or that way. Abraham was willing to kill Isaac because he guessed God would resurrect him, not because he understood why.

Have you read the SOP examples I posted? If you are correct, then Abraham and Moses rendered "slavish obedience." If the Israelites wanted to live through the snake bite, God required "slavish obedience" from them, if you are correct.

But MM is correct on this point. Understanding is nice, but not necessary in order to obey.

What you have in mind is not obedience, at least not as described by the Holy Spirit. Rather, it is concurrence. It is treating God as a friend, rather than a father.

Arnold, you didn't post the quotes here, but referred to them, so I have to surmise which you are referring to. Looking back over the posts on this thread, I see which one which speaks of Abraham's being willing to sacrifice his son, and another speaking of looking and living to be cured of the serpent's bite. These are the ones it seemed to me you would most likely be referring to.

Let's consider these acts in relation to the quote I cited:



Is this the case regarding Abraham? Certainly. It was because Abraham had a conviction regarding God's character that he acted as he did. He was convinced that God is love, and was also convinced that God would resurrect his son from death.

Regarding looking and living, those who were bit might not understand how God would cure them. Similarly we cannot understand how the Holy Spirit is able to create a new life in our soul when we respond to His presentation of Christ crucified for us.

The point here is that God does not remove any hooks upon which we can hang our doubts. He provides enough evidence that we can make an intelligent decision, but does not remove every occasion for our having doubt. I'm not saying that every single thing must be understood before a person can render obedience, but that obedience requires understanding.

I think it would be helpful to get the context for our present conversation. Let's consider something you said, which led into this discussion:



Here you perceive your father to be doing wrong because he is "too proud" to think that God can require them to obey the Sabbath without their knowing why. I think your father is right not to obey the Sabbath, if he sees no reason to. I think the problem may not be with your father, but with those who have been seeking to educate him regarding the Sabbath, if he is unable to see any reason why it should be kept.

Now I'm not privy to enough information to make a judgment in regards to this case. I'm simply speaking of the general principles involved. There are plenty of good reasons for keeping the Sabbath, so it shouldn't be difficult to present an argument which brings out these points. It certainly couldn't be argued that God expects us to keep the Sabbath for no good reason.





To give further context to our discussion, it began with the idea that God will zap our memories so that we cannot remember any sins that we have committed. This was based on (IMO) a forced interpretation of the Spirit of Prophecy, taking her words literally to convey a meaning she did not intend. I pointed out that the interpretation being suggested is contrary to common sense, and offered the following interpretation in its place:



This is an interpretation given by one who was a contemporary of Ellen White, and was able to be corrected by her if he was speaking out of turn. This interpretation has the advantage of making perfect sense.

Anyway, this was the context of the conversation we are now having regarding whether or not understanding is a necessary component of obedience. To be clear, my point is not that we have to understand all things in order to render obedience, but that understanding is a component of obedience.

To obey without any understanding whatever would be slavish obedience. Indeed, I cannot think of a better definition of such than this.

To consider understanding a "nice to have" seems to me to be particularly dangerous. Let me simply ask, if you are going do something about which you have no understanding, how can you know you are obeying God and not the enemy?

I had this long response, very insightful, and would have settled this issue forever , but clumsy fingers pressed Ctrl+Shift+W. Those who use Firefox know what this does. Anyway....

Here are the quotes:

Regarding "army" obedience:


Does your paradigm accept this kind of "blind obedience"?

Does your paradigm accept this kind of "intelligent appreciation"?









These quotes are bringing out the points I've been trying to make.

I'm interested in your answer to this question:

Of course it does. I will try to explain this again, for the third time. Quote from post #104884:

Does that make any sense? "Intelligent appreciation" is a good thing. In case you missed it, "intelligent appreciation" is a good thing.

But I do not make it my god. My brain is too small and weak to trust its intelligence as the basis of my life. I would rather trust the God of heaven.


But nobody is disputing that God wants us to understand what He's saying and doing. The problem is that you say it is impossible to obey without understanding, while the SOP has a number of examples to the contrary.


Like, for example, someone telling Abraham to kill his son, and him knowing that it was God telling him that, and not Satan? But when Satan tried to get Jesus to sin by quoting Scripture to Him, Jesus wasn't fooled? I suppose His sheep know His voice. I can't give you a foolproof algorithm to tell the difference, because it is probably a spiritual matter, not an intellectual one.

How about you? If you read instructions in the Bible for which you could not discern an acceptable rationale, would you disregard it until you understood why? Or would you consider the possibility that human wisdom is infantile in comparison to God's, and that you're simply not as smart as God?

I'll redo something I wrote in my lost post.

When I lived in the jungle, I learned the importance of quick and complete obedience. Living in such a place with a wife and a toddler is a serious matter. If I gave a command and someone took the time to ask for an explanation before obeying, it could be disastrous. The time it takes to find out why may be the time it takes for a wild boar to insert its tusk in your abdomen or for a cobra to bite your foot. The choice to immediately obey when you hear, "Stop!" may be the difference between standing on solid ground or taking the first step down a cliff.

That's why I asked you if you have ever led a group through a dangerous situation. I have an idea what it's like to be a leader and a follower in such a group. Mutual trust - trust to the point of immediate and complete obedience - is not optional.

Aren't you of the belief that if God wasn't constantly protecting us, all hell would break loose, snakes would be biting us, we would be killing each other, and all sorts of other bad things would happen as an immediate result? Our sin-marred environment is a dangerous place. If we don't trust God implicitly, we won't make it through alive.

Those who obey His word because they trust Him, lack of understanding notwithstanding, are being guided by One who has been through it before and came out fine. Those who need an explanation for everything are being guided by the faulty reasoning of a sin-damaged mind. The choice looks pretty simple to me.