When I was young, the words “obedience” and “listen” were like bad words to me.
Harold “Hop” Ballinger
I thought that rules existed to keep us away from the fun and the good stuff.
I found that naughty “felt good”, and I wasn’t wise enough to understand that things in life had very real consequences.
I didn’t trust adults, or the law, or religion, or history to teach me anything valuable “in real life” — it was just “the way you’re supposed to behave”.
And I didn’t know God in any real and tangible way that would have me desiring to seek wise and healthy things in my life.
Even as an adult, I can sometimes fall back into those old, foolish, wasteful, harmful habits. But life experience continues to teach me (the hard way) how truly valuable it is to:
1) listen to wisdom
2) obedience isn’t a bad word
3) truly seeking God personally is so very different from “religion”
Harold J. Ballinger 