O-B-E-D-I-E-N-C-E

when i was little, one of our myriad tapes on faith & virtue had a song proclaiming "obedience is / the very best way / to show that you believe". dealing with my increasinly "two-year-old" son, whom today disobeyed me literally every single time i asked him to do something, the subject naturally has been on my mind quite a bit. as soon as i lay me down on the couch to feed Alastair, Finn takes it as open season for stories--which it is. i do not want him to feel left out. so this evening, whilst my darling husband made dinner and i was maybe half-awake on the couch, Finn brought his cheesey little "children's Bible", containing the story of Noah. "Noah was obedient," says i, "so God saved Noah and Noah saved the animals." having inherited the seeds of defiance, perhaps rebellion, i've never before given obedience qua obediene much thought or credence. tonight it struck me, however: God destroyed the world because they disobeyed. that's it. they just disobeyed. i know this is nothing new, that many of us have heard from the time we can remember understanding that Adam and Eve disobeyed and ate the apple and so God sent them etcetera etcetera. no, but they disobeyed. like when i chose to ignore my parents (the one and only time i did *that* . . . ha), or when my son looks at me when i ask him to come, and runs away instead . . . disobedience can seem such a trivial, insignificant thing, but it isn't. that is the crux of salvation: to obey or disobey. we hear a lot about non servum and that's good poweful stuff, but all that means is choosing to disobey God, like a spoiled or undisciplined child. so when i, as a parent, consider how i need to parent in order to equip my sons with the tools of salvation, it starts here and now: obedience.