The Discipline of Obedience
Stop Asking God to Bless Your Plans
Phase II | Week 9 of 12
Call to Order: The Question of Authority
Every man has to decide who will lead his life.
Some surrender to Christ. Others put all their trust in themselves. Most don’t pause to ask which one they are actually following.
The question is not whether you are living under authority, but under whose authority you are living. Your own desires. The approval of others. The next goal on your list. Or Christ.
Most men who call themselves Christians are not living in open rebellion against God. They are doing something far more subtle. They are following their own plans and desires, expecting God to bless the path they have already chosen.
That is not obedience. That is putting trust in yourself. Not in God.
The greatest threat to obedience is rarely outright rebellion. It is believing your way is better than God's.
CB007 established that your identity is found in Christ. CB008 challenged you to uphold the standards that shape the man you are becoming. CB009 goes one step further with obedience to God.
Who is leading your life?
Identity and standards both begin with obedience. Obedience is your daily response to that question. It is not a feeling. It is not a season of good intentions. It is the daily decision to surrender your will and follow Christ — in the areas that are easy and in those that cost something.
"Only he who believes is obedient, and only he who is obedient believes." — Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship
Bonhoeffer was not adding another burden for Christians to carry. He was describing the reality of genuine faith.
Faith and obedience are not competing ideas. They move together.
What Obedience Is Not
Before we go any further, we need to understand what obedience is not.
Obedience is not the path to earning God's love. It is the response to already having it.
The man who obeys as a means to earn God's approval is still trying to remain in control. He has simply turned Christianity into another self-improvement project. Obedience motivated by fear of punishment or the desire for a reward is not surrender. That is a transaction.
God is not looking for transactions. He is calling for transformation.
Obedience is also not behavior modification. It is not cleaning up the external life while the internal life remains unchanged. The Pharisees were experts at external compliance — and Jesus called them whitewashed tombs. The goal is not a better-behaved version of the man you already are. The goal is a transformed man who increasingly reflects the character of Christ.
Obedience is not to be confused with passivity either. It is not waiting for God to remove every obstacle before you move forward. It is not doing nothing and calling it surrender.
The obedient man is rarely passive. He simply refuses to move in any direction God has not called him to go.
Obedience is an act of trust. You obey before you understand everything because you trust the One who already does.
The Battle Within
Every man battles with sin. But the deeper battle is not against specific sinful behaviors. It is the daily temptation to trust ourselves rather than God. This struggle looks different for every man.
For some, it looks like ambition without surrender. For others, it looks like passivity, avoiding the hard things God is calling them to do. Sometimes it even looks like pursuing good things for the wrong reasons: career success, physical fitness, or ministry, all to elevate themselves rather than glorify God.
The issue is rarely the behavior alone. The real issue is who is in control.
When a man surrenders his plans to Christ, everything begins to change. Life does not suddenly become easier, but it does become clearer. Decisions that once required lengthy negotiations become simpler—not because they cost less, but because the standard is no longer personal comfort or preference. It is obedience to Christ.
"Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is — his good, pleasing and perfect will." — Romans 12:2
The transformation Paul describes here is not a one-time decision. It is a daily renewal. A daily choice to surrender your mind, will, and actions to Christ rather than conform to the values of the world around you.
A Personal Word
For more than half my life, I chose my own path. I was confident in my ability to figure things out. If I wanted something badly enough, I knew I would find a way to accomplish it. That was not entirely wrong — but if I'm being honest, it was driven by selfish desire.
Since becoming a Christian, I sensed God calling me to something more. The problem wasn't that I rejected my faith. It was that I refused to fully surrender to it. I believed in Christ, yet I continued living on my own terms. I was a Christian in name, but my life reflected very little of what He was calling me to become.
For a long time, I convinced myself it was working. Until it didn't.
The things I had once justified to myself were beginning to weigh on me. Not all at once—gradually. Each time I made a choice I knew was wrong, the weight grew heavier. What had once been quiet became loud. I was not just failing the standards God had called me to uphold. I was failing the people He had entrusted to my care. My wife. My sons. I was the man who provided financially while being emotionally and spiritually absent.
I hit spiritual rock bottom. It was that moment I finally stopped trying to lead my own life.
In that moment—angry at myself, grieving what I had cost my family, and exhausted from carrying everything on my own—I repented. This was not a prayer given to check a box. It was genuine repentance. Turning away from my own plans and toward Christ. I did not know what the future would look like. I just knew I could not keep going the way I had been.
What happened next was not immediate comfort. It was something better. It was clarity. The direction of my life changed—not all at once, but one step at a time. God gave me enough light to take the next step and, in doing so, prepared me for the one that followed. The man I was becoming began to look more like the man God had been calling me to be all along.
I did not feel set free because life got easier. I felt set free because I finally surrendered control.
That was more than half a decade ago. Even now, I battle sin every day. Following Christ did not remove that struggle, but it completely changed my direction. Through His death and resurrection, Jesus paid the penalty for my sin—past, present, and future. Because of that, I no longer fight for victory. I fight from victory.
I continue to stumble and have days where I fall short. But by God's grace, I do not remain down. I repent, rise again, and continue on the path He has laid out for me. I am not the man I used to be, and thanks to His grace, I am still becoming the man He calls me to be.
Obedience and the Six Domains
Obedience is not confined to what happens in a church building or during a quiet time. It is expressed in every area of life.
In the Mind domain, obedience means taking every thought captive and bringing it under the authority of Christ instead of believing whatever feels right. In the Body, it means faithfully stewarding the body God has entrusted to you, not to impress others, but to honor Him. In Relationships, it means leading your family with presence, humility, and sacrifice instead of retreating into what is comfortable. In Vocation, it means pursuing excellence because you serve Christ, not because you crave the approval of others. In Adventure, it means trusting God enough to step into the unknown when He calls rather than settling for the safety of what is familiar.
Every domain becomes an opportunity to practice obedience. Every decision is another answer to the same question: Who is leading your life?
That is the progression CB009 is built on.
Christ defines your identity. Obedience is the daily expression of that identity. Faithful stewardship is how that identity is lived out in every area of life.
The Framework: The Devotion Cycle — Obedience Deepened
CB003 introduced The Devotion Cycle: Receive, Respond, Refine, Reflect. CB009 dives deeper into the Refine step—the daily self-examination that reveals where obedience has slipped and where we have begun following our own plans rather than Christ's.
The Devotion Cycle is how PIR3 operates in the Spirit domain. If you have not read it, you can read it here: CB000
Refine Step — Deepened
To Refine is not to condemn yourself. It is about honestly examining where your life aligns with Christ—and where it doesn't.
You cannot surrender what you refuse to address.
The question is not simply, "What did I do wrong today?" The better question is, "Where did I choose my own way instead of God's today?" That is a different question. It moves beyond behavior and exposes the heart. The goal is not to try harder tomorrow. The goal is to surrender more completely.
A practical Refine practice looks like this. At the end of each day, ask yourself three questions:
Where did I choose my own desires over what Christ was calling me to do?
Where did I live in obedience today—and what did that cost me?
Where is Christ calling me to surrender tomorrow?
Obedience is not evaluated once a year or even once a week. It is examined daily—and the Refine step is where that examination happens.
This Week's Order: Daily Surrender
This week is about surrendering your plans before asking God to bless them. Obedience is not a one-time decision but a daily posture of trusting God's direction over your own.
Run the obedience audit:
Write down one area of your life where you have been asking God to bless your direction rather than seeking His. Be specific.
Identify one decision this week where obedience cost you something. Comfort. Approval. Convenience. What did following Christ require of you?
Run the Refine step tonight. Where did I choose my own way instead of God's today? Where is Christ calling me to surrender tomorrow?
Establish your spiritual floor. What is the minimum daily practice you refuse to compromise, regardless of the season? Write it down. That is your standard.
Stop asking God to bless your plans and surrender to His.
Every act of obedience declares who is leading your life. Make sure your life speaks this truth.
Conclusion and Looking Ahead
Three weeks into Phase II, the picture is becoming clear. Christ defines your identity. Standards shape the man you are becoming. Obedience is the daily expression of both.
These are not separate disciplines. They are different expressions of the same pursuit: faithfully stewarding the life God has entrusted to you.
A man who knows who he is in Christ, upholds the standards that shape his character, and daily surrenders his will to God's is building something that will stand firm when life becomes difficult—not because of his own strength, but because his life is built on the only foundation that cannot be shaken.
You are not fighting for victory. You are fighting from it. Christ has already won.
As Christian men, we should be living like it.
Next week's Command Brief moves into the Relationships domain—The Discipline of Covenant.
We'll look at what it means to faithfully steward the relationships God has entrusted to you by living as a husband, father, friend, and leader whose commitments are shaped by your covenant rather than by convenience or emotion.
AFTER ACTION REVIEW
Where are you still trusting yourself instead of Christ—and what would genuine surrender in that area actually cost you?
Stand firm.
— Charlie
THE MISSION | COMMAND BRIEF 009 | Spirit | The Discipline of Obedience