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Monday, November 29, 2010“…do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ.”
-Galatians 1:10
Many Christians today are under the false impression that you can live in this world while pleasing both God and man. And while it’s true that some occasions may arise in which you can do the will of God without being hated, it is impossible to consistently live a godly life without ruffling the feathers of at least a few.
Take the life of David, for example. Today he is admired as a great hero of the faith; yet during his time on earth, it was not at all uncommon for him to spend the night in caves and other makeshift shelters just to avoid being murdered by his enemies. Among these enemies was his own son, Absalom, who tried to usurp his fathers authority (II Samuel), and his predecessor, King Saul, who had massive armies at his disposal with which he sought David’s life. During these times, David was no less than a vagabond, wandering from place to place in search of safety, and rarely finding any.
At any of these times, David could’ve cried “uncle” and saved himself a lot of earthly trouble. He could’ve stepped to the side and allowed Absalom to become king just as easily as he could have told Saul he could have the spotlight again and keep being the terrible king he truly was. In other words, David could have chosen to please men; but the fact was, and often is, that pleasing men would have been displeasing God.
David, though not without his faults, was somebody who had a very good set of priorities. He put first things first, and let everything else take care of itself. Whether hiding in the Israeli wilderness hoping to live through the night, or sitting on the king’s throne enjoying the best that life could offer, he made up his mind that pleasing God would always be at the top of his list. We would do well to make that same decision.
4 comments:
Great thoughts on pleasing God. When I preached the Gospel in my class one time, I could see all the faces of the onlookers staring down at me with anger. It was not a pretty sight, but I definitely knew that it was pleasing to God based off their looks. They were totally ruffled.
In Christ,
Joshua :)
And it does not get easier as you get older. In fact, I think there are often more, and much subtler, ways that it is easy to slip into pleasing man and not God. How you educate and raise your children, for example, is really a hot-button with those who have chosen a different path. Even things like how you give birth and nourish infants can set some folks off. And then there is always pressure to go along with the crowd. In Christian circles (hopefully!) it is not things of blatant sin, but often of how much money to spend on personal pleasures, keeping up with the Joneses, how many and which activities you choose to participate in......
I have found that when I am in a place where I feel perfectly content with what I am doing, and everyone around me is perfectly happy with what I am doing....I may need to re-examine my life!
Thank you for your excellent devotion today.
This is great! So often we look at David's life and go wow, how exciting! But I guess if we put ourselves into his shoes it would be very different than wow probably more like yikes!
Putting God first can really upset man. My husband puts God first in his work place and it really does rock the boat and he has to keep his eyes on Jesus and rely on Him to protect him from the attacks of man.
God job Dakota I love this,
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It's strange, how we look at people's lives in the Bible, and never even think, "That should be me!" If we do, we immediately take the idea down, calling it impossible. In David's life, his persistent praise of God and focus on Him is amazing. Good deduction -- David's life should inspire ours to keep our total focus on God. I daily need this reminder. Thanks!
Camden
Gotta say, these two verses are a really good comparison:
Psalm 26:3
For your steadfast love is before my eyes,and I walk in your faithfulness.
Psalm 34:15
The eyes of the LORD are toward the righteous and his ears toward their cry.
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