Becoming a Community of Disciples

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Becoming a Community of Disciples

Obedience (RBen §5) 1 The first step of humility is obedience without hesitation. 2 This comes naturally to those who esteem nothing as more beloved to them than Christ. 3 Whether on account of the holy service they have professed or because of the fear of hell and the glory of eternal life, 4 as soon as anything is ordered by the superior it is as if it had been commanded by God himself; and they cannot bear any hesitation in doing it. 5 Of these men the Lord says: on hearing with his ear he has obeyed me (Ps 18:44). 6 And again he says to teachers: he who hears you hears me (Luke 10:16). 7 Such as these, therefore, leaving immediately all that is theirs and forsaking their own wills 8 at once disengage their hands, and leaving unfinished what they were doing, follow by their deeds with the eager step of obedience the voice of him who commands: 9 and as it were in a single moment the master’s bidding and the disciple’s completed work are both, in the swiftness of the fear of God, instantly achieved. 10 Those whom love impels to advance on the way of eternal life— 11 these lay hold of the narrow way of which the Lord says: Narrow is the way which leads to life (Matt 7:14): 12 so that by neither living according to their own wills, nor obeying their own desires and pleasures, they walk instead according to the judgment and command of another, living in community and desiring to have an Abbot govern them. 13 Without doubt such as these embody that saying of the Lord which reads: I did not come do my own will, but that of him who sent me (John 6:38). 14 But this very obedience will be acceptable to God and sweet to men only if what is commanded is not done