1Thes 4:1
Furthermore then we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more.
The title that I am using in my posting speaks of the immanent destruction that can take place if spiritual truths are not grasped by the child of God,
What I want to share with you I believe is going to help you in your receiving from the Lord.
Look at the scripture again,
that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more.
Listen to Paul,
As we have taught you and instructed you as how to walk and please God, the reason that we have done this is so you can abound more and more.
I believe that this is the universal heart cry of every born again child of God, teach me how to walk and please you Lord, show me how to walk and please you, instruct me, chastise me, lead me and guide me until I know and walk in the realms of pleasing you.
We all desire to hear these words spoken to us by the Lord in
Matt 25:21
Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.
And yet how many of us do not feel that we are walking and pleasing God, how many of us feel inadequate, how many of us feel that we are insufficient and lacking when it comes to walking and pleasing the Lord.
And I need to tell you that these feelings are a recipe for disaster, they are destructive and they will ultimately rob you of all that you are and all that you do for Christ.
This is the place where condemnation is birthed in our life, this is where dissatisfaction and low self esteem is birthed into our lives when we desire to walk and please and then do not believe that we are able to do it.
I will say it again
All of us desire to walk and please God and yet very few of us really believe that we are walking and pleasing God
Now hear me because I am going to say something very radical,
I believe that there is such a disparity between the desire to please God and the feelings that we are pleasing God and I believe that it originates from and is produced from religion.
Religion is always a misrepresentation of God unless that religion is pure and undefiled before God.
James 1:27
Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.
I wonder if God’s people understand that being a Christian is not about you reaching out to God but rather it is God reaching out to you.
There are many religions who reach out to God and every one of them misrepresent God in some way or another, religion has its own opinions, its own rules and regulations, its own standards and it will create in you a false set of standards that we prefer to call holy,
And in those false standards we have been given falsehoods of what God is seeking and looking for in the midst of those He calls His own.
What is it that God is looking for in the child of the living God?
What is it that pleases God when He looks upon us and sees us as His children?
How is it that we are to walk?
How is it that we are to please him whom we have given our lives to?
Here are some things that immediately come to mind as to how religion says that we are to please him.
#1 you must live holy
#2 you must be free from sin in your life
#3 you need to treat your spouse well and treat other people with kindness
#4 you must help those in need
But allow me to show you something in scripture
Heb 11:6
But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
It is faith that pleases God and not your performance, good works or presentation; it is your faith and believing that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who are diligently seeking Him.
Religion does not preach this in fact many churches who proclaim to be Christian do not preach this, their message is that if you do right, if your actions are right God will accept you,
That is not the gospel of the New Testament.
Do we really have understanding as to the group of people who persecuted Christ?
It was not the unbeliever, and it was not the heathen, it was the religious crowd.
Pilate was willing to let Him go, Pilates wife had received a dream from God and sent a messenger to tell her husband to have nothing to do with this just man,
It was the religious system that crucified Christ
Yes the Roman government sent Him to the cross but only because they were manipulated by Jewish leaders.
Jesus came preaching that God loves you, Jesus came preaching that God will accept you through faith through His beloved Son and you would be fully redeemed and justified in faith in Him and it would usher you into right standing with God,
And it upset the religious system of that day as it upsets the religious system of this day.
The religious people always want to deal with the outward things but God desires to deal with the inward things.
Listen to me
Deal with the inward things and it will take care of the outward things.
Listen to the Lord in
Matt 23:25-28
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess.
Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness.
Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.
It is this system that killed Christ the Messiah and the one question that should be paramount within the body of Christ today is how much of that system, how much opinion and self righteousness and pleasing comes into play within the body of Christ today that was prevalent at the time of Christ, how much of the religious system that killed Christ is present within this body of Christ today, how much of the religious system that Christ hated and rejected and verbally called devils and hypercritics abides and lives within us.
The things that were prevalent then are prevalent now and the things that took place then are taking place now.
The same spirit that existed when Christ took a whip and drove the money changers from the temple, that same spirit exists within many of our churches today.
That same spirit of performance and competition, the same spirit of grievous offences, the same spirit of killing our own that was present in that day is still present in this day and I believe that we need to take a good look to see how much of that same spirit is still present within the body of Christ today.
Matt 5:20
For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.
One of the religious problems that the Pharisees and Sadducees had was that they were constantly looking on the outside and they desired others to view them from the outside.
Listen to Jesus in,
Matt 23:25-26
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess.
Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.
And what this really amounts to is people taking notice of your actions and wanting people to follow those actions, your actions are nothing more than a by-product of what is really in your heart.
The word of God tells us that as a man so thinketh in his heart so he is.
How important are actions,
They are very important and the reason that they are important is because in human relationships actions either strengthen or destroy, but in the realm of the spirit God looks beyond your actions and sees the motive of your heart which is the result of your actions.
1 Cor 13:3
And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.
How radical can you get?
The scripture is very clear, your actions are not the real thing that God looks at, and your actions are not the determining thing that will move God,
Once again, actions are nothing more than the by product of your attitude and personality and how you really are in your heart.
When you are trying to please God in your actions and in your performance you are always going to fail.
Why
Because flesh can not please God
1 Cor 1:29
That no flesh should glory in his presence.
The standard of perfection in the sight of Almighty God is His Son the Lord Jesus Christ, only He is the lamb that was slain from the foundations of the world, and only He is the righteousness of the Father.
Heb 6:1
Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God,
And because of Him we have been accepted in the beloved.
Eph 1:6
To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
Because He made provision for me, because He pitied me, because I was lost and helpless in my condition, because I was a sinner, but now I am accepted in the in beloved and because I am accepted in the beloved I please God.
I can not tell you what that would do for your Christian walk if you understood that you are pleasing to God.
You ought to go buy some sweatshirts and place your church on the back and on the front I PLEASE GOD.
I can not tell you how many people would be offended and would consider you arrogant and prideful and the reason that this bold statement is not and can not be accepted within the realms of the church is because of one reason and that reason is performance.
The church needs to get to the place where they have a relationship with God based on what God has done for them instead of what they are doing for God,
Everything that could ever be done for you to have and to obtain salvation and favor has already been done.
There is nothing that you can do to earn; there is nothing that you can do to justify what you already have, the reason that you please God is because of what He has already done for you and by the way, the faith that He has given you is the same faith by which you please Him.
The only thing left for you to do is to accept it, believe it and walk in it.
By His faith,
Who is the author and finisher of your faith, it is the Lord Jesus Christ, the same faith that He is the author and finisher of is the same faith that He gave to you and it is through that faith that you please God and all that you have to do is to believe it
God loves you because God is love and not because you are lovely.
He has extended salvation unto you and all that you have to do is humbly accept it and if you will accept it you will become pleasing to the Father
Heb 11:5
By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.
Follow me,
Here is a man that was translated that he should not see death, he was a man who was taken from the face of this earth, he was translated by God or in other words God took him
Why was he taken?
Because he pleased God, he had this testimony that he was pleasing to God.
What is a testimony?
It is something that you tell to others
What did he tell to others?
That he pleased God
How could he have this testimony that he pleased God when in the Old Testament the sacrifice of bulls and lambs or in other words performance could not satisfy God?
That is why there would be a better way, the way of Jesus Christ, the way of faith in accepting Jesus Christ and here in the Old Testament we see Enoch pleasing God
How?
By faith
And it so pleased God that he was not found because God took him
Glory
Hebrews 11:6
But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
Now follow me
Two men were translated and did not die in the old Testament Enoch was one and the other was Elijah.
IKing 19:1
And Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and withal how he had slain all the prophets with the sword.
Then Jezebel sent a messenger unto Elijah, saying, So let the gods do to me, and more also, if I make not thy life as the life of one of them by to morrow about this time.
And when he saw that, he arose, and went for his life, and came to Beersheba, which belongeth to Judah, and left his servant there.
But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree: and he requested for himself that he might die; and said, It is enough; now, O LORD, take away my life; for I am not better than my fathers.
And as he lay and slept under a juniper tree, behold, then an angel touched him, and said unto him, Arise and eat.
And he looked, and, behold, there was a cake baken on the coals, and a cruse of water at his head. And he did eat and drink, and laid him down again.
And the angel of the LORD came again the second time, and touched him, and said, Arise and eat; because the journey is too great for thee.
And he arose, and did eat and drink, and went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of God.
And he came thither unto a cave, and lodged there; and, behold, the word of the LORD came to him, and he said unto him, What doest thou here, Elijah?
And he said, I have been very jealous for the LORD God of hosts: for the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.
And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the LORD. And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake:
And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.
And it was so, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle, and went out, and stood in the entering in of the cave. And, behold, there came a voice unto him, and said, What doest thou here, Elijah?
And he said, I have been very jealous for the LORD God of hosts: because the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.
And the LORD said unto him, Go, return on thy way to the wilderness of Damascus: and when thou comest, anoint Hazael to be king over Syria:
And Jehu the son of Nimshi shalt thou anoint to be king over Israel: and Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abelmeholah shalt thou anoint to be prophet in thy room.
And it shall come to pass, that him that escapeth the sword of Hazael shall Jehu slay: and him that escapeth from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha slay.
Yet I have left me seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him.
So he departed thence, and found Elisha the son of Shaphat, who was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen before him, and he with the twelfth: and Elijah passed by him, and cast his mantle upon him.
And he left the oxen, and ran after Elijah, and said, Let me, I pray thee, kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow thee. And he said unto him, Go back again: for what have I done to thee?
And he returned back from him, and took a yoke of oxen, and slew them, and boiled their flesh with the instruments of the oxen, and gave unto the people, and they did eat. Then he arose, and went after Elijah, and ministered unto him.
Now get this
Here is a man who is running from Jezebel fearing for his life, he is depressed, he is weary from fighting the good fight of faith against the evil works of king Ahab and Jezebel
Listen to him in verse 10
And he said, I have been very jealous for the LORD God of hosts: because the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.
Here is a man who has heard an audible voice from the Lord telling him what to do
VERSE 11
And the LORD said unto him, Go, return on thy way to the wilderness of Damascus: and when thou comest, anoint Hazael to be king over Syria:
And Jehu the son of Nimshi shalt thou anoint to be king over Israel: and Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abelmeholah shalt thou anoint to be prophet in thy room.
But what does Elijah do, he immediately goes and anoints Elisha.
Why?
Because he is tired, he is ready to give up, he felt that he was the only one left, he was discouraged and disappointed with himself.
He was ready to get out and ready to give up so he went to Elisha first when he was told by the Lord to go to him last,
He never did anoint Hazael to be king over Syria and he never did anoint Jehu to be king over Israel.
Two/thirds of what God told him to do he did not do because of discouragement and disappointment.
Elisha the successor of Elijah would be the one to do those two things not Elijah the one who was commanded to do them.
And yet here is a man who pleased God
How do I know that he pleased God?
Because the same translation that took place with Enoch took place with Elijah
II Ki 2:11
And it came to pass, as they still went on, and talked, that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven.
I want to tell you something and this will mess with people’s theology,
Elijah pleased God when he failed miserably, Elijah pleased God when he did not get done what God wanted him to do, Elijah pleased God when he was discouraged and disappointed and Elijah pleased God when he wanted God to take his life
Why was God pleased?
It is faith that pleases God and not performance.
This ought to impact your life,
None of us please God by our actions; we please God by our faith.
Heb 11:6
But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.