What Happens When We Disobey God?

Blog Series: Helpful Tips for Saving Yourself from Trouble

It is said that you cannot break the laws of God. You can only break yourself against them when you violate them. In this series we are looking at some of the simple and clear “laws of God” – that is to say, “biblical principles” – that we must follow if we do not want to bring very negative cause-effect consequences into our lives.

Life has a two-way mirror

When I was in graduate school, I worked at a clinic that provided remedial therapy for children with mild learning disabilities. It was a rewarding experience as I saw many children who were obviously very bright, but were getting poor grades in school and were often discipline problems, turn into good students.

As part of the therapy, we gave the students assignments to do, and then we left the room to go into an adjoining room where we could watch them through a two-way mirror. The students were told that we would be behind the mirror watching them, but some often had very short attention spans, and soon forgot that we were behind the mirror. They would goof off, disrupt others and forget about their assignments.

When they drifted from their assignment, we re-entered the room to help them, reminding them that we were watching, and got them re-focused on their responsibility. We used this technique to help the children develop longer attention spans.

It was often comical to see the children begin to lose concentration. Often, they would look up from their work slightly glassy eyed and begin to glance aimlessly around the room. Then, they might look right at the mirror, wrinkle their nose or stick out their tongue, or straighten their hair. Often, they pestered their neighbors. It amazed me that they so easily lost sight of the fact that we were behind the mirror looking at them.

When we went back into the room it always snapped them back to reality. With red face and embarrassed grin, they resumed their work. Over time, as they finally “got it” that we were behind the mirror, most of the students were able to lengthen their concentration span considerably, which helped them to do better in school.

Doesn’t this remind you of our relationship with God? Life is lived in front of a two-way mirror. God can see us, but we can’t see him. There are things we know we should or should not do, but God is not “in the room.” We can’t see Him, and over time, we lose sight of Him. We even begin to think that He isn’t there anymore. So, we stick out our tongues at heaven or walk around goofing off or disrupting our neighbors.

Life would go so much better for us if we would only remember that God is behind the mirror. We have spiritual learning disabilities. We have short spiritual attention spans. We’re supposed to be manifesting the character and proclaiming the name of Jesus, but instead we can find ourselves goofing off or acting badly.

What happens when we disobey God?

When that happens, God “comes into the room” to help us, to do something to enable us to grow, mature, deepen.

We cannot break the laws of God. We can only break ourselves against his laws when we ignore or violate them. We think we can ignore the truth and get away with it. We can’t. We think we can sidestep obedience to God when we want without paying a price. We can’t.

There is always a price, and the price is in proportion to the sin. Some sins have a greater consequence than others. The sin of mild laziness does not have as great a consequence as sexual promiscuity, for example. But there is always a price.

The price of disobedience comes in two forms

1. It comes in the natural, cause-effect consequences of our actions.

If we are mildly lazy, for example, we might miss out on a promotion at work which would have paid us more money to be able to afford a reliable car. No thunderbolt comes down out of the sky to strike us. But we pay a price anyway — a natural, cause/effect price.

Or if we are sexually promiscuous, we may pay the cause/effect consequence of contracting a sexually transmitted disease, emotional problems or an unwanted pregnancy. There is no thunderbolt out of heaven to zap us, in that case. It’s just that people who are sexually promiscuous pay a painful price. It is part of the “natural” scheme of things.

Galatians 6:7-8 says, “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption…”

2. On the other hand, there are times when God does bring direct judgment into the life of a person for sins committed. There is, sometimes, a thunderbolt, as it were, zapping us from heaven. We read in Hebrews 12:5-6, “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the lord, nor faint when you are reproved by him; for those whom the lord loves he disciplines, and he scourges every son whom he receives.”

So there we have it. There is always a price to be paid for disobedience. It is usually commensurate with the sin, though, in our eyes, not always. Sometimes worse, sometimes not as bad. But always there.

Why does God require obedience from us?

Everything God asks of us, he does so because he wants to give something good to us and/or keep some harm from us.

Like an athlete under a closely scrutinized training program, or a piano student in a carefully- monitored practice regimen, or a soldier involved in expert preparation for special operations warfare, there is no wasted motion with God. Every action, every attitude, every rehearsal contributes to the ultimate goal of becoming more like Christ. If we get lazy or careless or rebellious, it only delays the realization of the goal.

We read in Psalm 19:7-11, “The law of the LORD is perfect, restoring the soul; The testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple. The precepts of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; The commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; The judgments of the LORD are true; they are righteous altogether. They are more desirable than gold, yes, than much fine gold; Sweeter also than honey and the drippings of the honeycomb. Moreover, by them Your servant is warned; In keeping them there is great reward.”

If these words are true – and of course they are – it would unwise to be willfully disobedient to the Lord. Yet, in spite of everything, we are often disobedient! We forget that God is behind the mirror. It is self-defeating. It is self-destructive. It is counter-productive. It keeps us from enjoying the very things we want from life. But we sometimes do it anyway.

Conclusion

We need to remind ourselves of the truth – over and over, if necessary. We said earlier that we cannot break the laws of God. We can only break ourselves against them when we violate them. When we mature to the point that we “get” that, it can give us the resolve to do what is right.

When we come to the point at which we really believe that true happiness lies in following God and not self, we can gain the power to turn from sin.

Next week, we’ll look a little further at the good news of what happens when we obey God. See you then!

In case you’re new here

The entire “Helpful Tips for Saving Yourself from Trouble” series is in the archives, beginning with the first post on July 26, 2022. As the series continues, each succeeding post will be added to and available in the blog archives.

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