Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Micha Boyett

Home
Family, Parenting and Religion
{Practicing Benedict} When love is obedience

{Practicing Benedict} When love is obedience

Last updated on: May 20, 2012 at 2:32 pm by michaboyett

{Practicing Benedict} When love is obedience 2012-05-20T14:32:01-07:00 michaboyett

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Welcome to Mama:Monk’s weekly Wednesday series examining St. Benedict’s Rule and what it’s teaching me about motherhood and the praying life…

“The first step on the way to humility is to obey an order without delaying for a moment. That is a response which comes easily to those who hold nothing dearer than Christ himself” (St. Benedict’s Rule, Chapter 5).

Oh, how I’ve dreaded this post! Why, Benedict, do you use that word we all avoid? We like a lot of words in our common Christian language, but the word Obedience gets us all fidgety. We don’t want to appear rigid. We prefer to think of the God of grace, not the God who commands. We have trouble with the hope of balancing grace and law, justice and mercy, wrath and kindness. Are those things opposites? Is God a god of opposites, of extremes? Or is God a god of balance, of deep breaths, rest in the midst of purpose?

(Side-note, 12 years ago I helped lead a youth camp where the t-shirts said one word: “Obedience” with the word “die” highlighted in the middle. Why are we Christians so freakishly scary?!)

As I’ve been studying Benedict’s Rule for the past two years, the vows of stability and poverty have challenged me as beautiful possibilities for what the world could be, what I could be. But they often seem distant, vague, something beautiful because they are so far from my daily reality.

This third Benedictine vow? I know what it means. I know how to do it. And that’s what’s frightening. See, I never vowed to “obey” my husband. I didn’t even let the preacher pronounce us as “Mr. and Mrs. Christopher Hohorst.” It was too much to me. I told our minister several times, “I want you to say Mr. Christopher Hohorst and Mrs. Micha Boyett Hohorst.” My husband nodded his head and smiled.

We did vow to submit to one another out of love. (Which, is a much more difficult task. That means sometimes I’m right and sometimes I’m wrong. Sometimes my husband is right and sometimes he’s wrong. And we have to wrestle through the right and wrong to find the truth. That, to me, looks a lot more like the work of the Spirit than the submission of one sex to the other.)

So, if St. Benedict is calling his monks toward a constant submission to the one in authority over them–the monk in charge, or the abbott, or the bishop, or the pope–then who is in authority over me?

I think it’s obvious, right? I just to don’t want to say it. Women have been silenced and abused in the name of obedience for as long as this world has spun. Aren’t we better off without acknowledging any kind of submission in marriage?

Last night I lay next to my spouse in bed while he read. I looked at him with my thinking face until he took his eyes off the screen and found mine. “Yes?” he said.

“Ummm. What does it mean for us to obey each other?” I asked. Then I crinkled my face and sighed and pulled the sheet up to my nose. He knows I hate this question.

Chris loves responding to deep questions. (I make him sound so serious around here, don’t I?): “It means that when you ask me to get Brooksie dressed for bed, I do it immediately…not because I want to stop what I’m doing but because I love you. It means I trust what you’re good at and you’re good at knowing what our kids need when they need it.”

“So that means I trust what you’re good at too,” I said, staring off at the wall. Like, when Chris tells me I’m being careless with our computer by setting my coffee right beside it when only 3 months ago we lost a computer via my coffee-spill. If I wanted to honor him, I’d think about where I sit that happy steaming cup.

Is that silly? Why have I never recognized that my willingness to listen to and honor my husband, without murmuring or rolling my eyes or resisting, is part of how I love him?

Benedict speaks of our “[carrying] out our orders…in a way that is not fearful, nor slow, nor half-hearted, no marred by murmuring or the sort of compliance that betrays resentment” (Chapter 5). And what if that was how my husband and I responded to one another?

If Chris trusts me and loves me and I love him and trust him, then I will be more careful of what I ask of him, knowing that he will do it immediately. Every request has more value when you know it will be carried out. Therefore, you treat it with more weight. Nagging is the result of us not taking seriously our requests or our response to those requests. Murmuring is nagging’s nasty little love-child. Is it possible for a married couple to deliberately live life without nagging and grumbling?! Maybe.

Benedict describes obedience as the first step to humility, the practice of recognizing that I do not have it all figured out, that I am made better by another’s wisdom.

Not fearful. Not slow. Not half-hearted. Not marred by bitterness or resentment. Isn’t this the woman I want to be?

Perhaps it starts with a simple practice of listening to my husband, of serving him as he serves me. Because, as The Benedictine Handbook, “In monastic life obedience and love are so intimately bound together that each becomes an expression of the other.”

Oh, Lord, grant this independent woman such grace that she might live in fearless, whole-hearted, bitter-free “obedience,” even if I’d rather not use that word…

Practicing Benedict

benedict

spiritual practice

Previous Post

December 6, 2011

Advent Thankful

Next Post

December 9, 2011 The Lord is With Thee

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category A Deeper Church Beautiful Beautiful and Broken Books Broken Deeper Story Family and the Christian Year Family Life Found Friends Guest Post Invitation Motherhood My Chalkboard One Good Phrase Pinterest Place and Stability Poetry Practicing Benedict Thankful Tuesday The Daily The Mama Monk the Praying Life The Pursuit of Enough This Sacred Everyday Uncategorized Vlog Women and the Church World Vision

Select a Month March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

True or False: James says that whoever keeps the whole law but stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.

Select your answer to see how you score.

TRUE FALSE