Greek and Hebrew words for obedience view it as a response. One hears, grasps what is communicated and acts on it. Thus, obedience is linked to God's revelation, and in both Testaments it is closely linked with relationship. They reality of a relationship with God is demonstrated by one's obedience to Him.
God commandeds nothing but what is beneficial. "O Israel, what doth the Lord require of thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, and to keep His statutes, which I command thee this day, for thy good?" To obey God, is not so much our duty as our privilege: His commands carry meat in the mouth of them. He bids us repent, and why? that our sins may be blotted out (Acts 3:19). He commands us to believe, and why: that we may be saved (Acts 16:31). There is love in every command: as if a king should bid one of his subjects dig in a gold mine, then take the gold to himself.
Watson, 1696
"Herein is My Father Glorified." A king is made glorious by the obedience of the subjects throughout his realm. He is honoured in that way. The parent is honoured by the child. How? Not by his running around the neighbourhood and saying, "Oh, what a great man my father is!" or, "What a beautiful woman my mother is!" or, "What a splended house my father has to live in!". For a child to do that would be ridiculous. We like to see a child manifest warmth and affection toward his parents; but publishing such things in the streets about one's parents is not glorifying those parents. If a child loves and honours his parents, he shows it by stuiously fulfilling their known wishes. An affectionate and loving child does honour his parents in the eye of all the heighbourhood. The teacher is honoured, not by what the pupil says, but by what he does. Find out what they want who are put over you, and do that; and then you honour them. And we honour, or, what is the same thing, we glorify God by fulfilling His known commands.
Beecher
Some will obey partially, obey some commandments, not others; like a plough which, when it comes to a stiff piece of earth, makes a baulk. But God that spake all the words of the moral law, will have all obeyed.
Watson, 1696
A good Christian is like a pair of compasses, one foot of the compass stands upon the centre, and the other foot of it goes round the circle; so a Christian by faith stands on God the centre, and by obedience goes round the circle of God's commandments.
Watson, 1696
"Sir," said the Duke of Wellington to an officer of engineers, who urged the impossibility of executing the directions he had received, "I did not ask your opinion, I gave you my orders, and I expect them to be obeyed." Such should be the obedience of every follower of Jesus. The words which He has spoken are our law, not our judgements or fancies. Even if death were in the way it is - "Not ours to reason why, Ours, but to dare and die;" - and, at our Master's bidding, addvance through flood or flame.
Spurgeon
Serve God with gladness and cheerfulness of heart, as one that hath found the way of life, and never had cause of gladness until now. If you see your servant do all his work with groans, and tears, and lamentations, you will not think that he is well pleased with his master and his work.
Baxter, 1615-1691
"I wish I could mind God as my little dog minds me," said a little boy, looking thoughtfully on his shaggy friend; "he always looks so pleased to mind, and I don't." What a painful truth did this child speak! Shall the poor little dog thus readily obey his master, and we rebel against God, who is our Creator, our Preserver, our Father, our Saviour, and the bountiful Giver o everything we love?
Christian Treasury
The son of a poor man, that hath not a penny to give or leave him, yields his father's obedience as cheerfully as the son of a rich man, that looks for a great inheritence. It is, indeed, love to the father, not wages from the father, that is the ground of a good child's obedience. If there were no heaven, God's children would obey Him, and though there were no hell, yet would they do their duty, so powerfully doth the love of the Father constrain them.
De Trugillo
Two things are chiefly to be eyed in obedience, the priniple and the end: a child of God though he shoots short in his obedience, yet he takes a right aim.
Watson, 1696
