The Right Reverend Craig Loya, tenth bishop of the Episcopal Church in Minnesota will be coming to our parish for his biannual visitation this Saturday, January 29th. You may or may not know this, but the word “episcopal” actually means “of or relating to a bishop.” In other words, the Episcopal Church is an episcopal church because our governing structure is based on bishops. So, it’s kind of a big deal when the bishop comes to town.

When I was ordained a priest, I made the promise to “obey” my bishop. In fact, every year, we ordained folk renew our vows, promising the same. It’s truly not as bad as it may sound!  In fact, in my thirty years of being a priest, I’ve never had a bishop command me to sit, stay, fetch or play dead. Frankly, I’m honored to make the vow of obedience over and over again, because obedience, when properly understood and experienced, isn’t about power at all.  It’s not about coercion. At its root, obedience is not about somebody with more power forcing somebody with less power to do or say or think or be anything at all. Obedience is about relationship.

The notion of obedience is found all over the place in the Bible.  Throughout the Old Testament, faithful men and women sometimes do wild and crazy things in obedience to God.  Noah builds an enormous watercraft to ferry the living things of the world to safety. Abraham leaves his home country where he has it made in order to live for many years in the dangerous desert.  Moses returns to Egypt, to the scene of the biggest crime of his life, to ask one of the most powerful rulers on the face of the earth to “let [God’s] people go.” In the New Testament, we hear of Paul who, out of obedience to the Voice on the Damascus Road, does a complete 180 to become a passionate apostle of Jesus.  Peter, in obedience to God’s directive in a dream, decides that it’s permissible for followers of Jesus to eat non-kosher food. And then we have Jesus himself who, “humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” (Philippians 2:8)

All these great ones obeyed not because God made them do it, or because God threatened, “Do it or else!”  No, Abraham and Moses and Noah and Paul and Peter and Jesus and countless others obeyed out of their love of God. Their courageous actions, often perceived by others as being flat-out crazy, were grounded in their trusting relationship with the God of abundant life. And God is always faithful.

It might sound kind of kooky, but the obedience to which we Christians are called is actually freeing. That’s right, when we humble ourselves to trust and obey as the old hymn says, we begin to actually experience the true freedom and peace that surpasses all human understanding. By obeying we become a little more like the people God dreams us to be. By obeying, we become free.  

Now, of course, the bishop isn’t Jesus and would never claim to be, but I have learned that by humbly trusting and obeying him, I have learned just a bit of what it means to obey Christ. By obeying, I have become a better priest and a more free man.   Let’s just hope that the bishop doesn’t ask me to roll over!

~Father Art