Success Means Pleasing God
People who have genuine faith and love for God will try to obey God.
To be a Christian is, in a sense, to be a man without a country. If you truly are obedient to Christ - if you take the Scriptures to heart and attempt to live them - you will inevitably come into conflict with the world. You belong to no one but Christ, while those in the world give themselves to people, possessions, institutions, and idols other than to Christ. To be a Christian is to stand apart and yet to remain within - to dare to be different. You look at everything through the prism of Scripture, and things look different when viewed biblically.
Success in the world means power, influence, money, prestige. But in the Christian world, it means pleasing God. This quest for obedience may lead you to do things that are wholly contrary to what the world wants and rewards. . .
Obeying his commandments means reading and understanding Scripture, then determining that you are going to live exactly as Scripture teaches. I don't believe anybody can do that, because it is almost impossible not to be caught up every day in the ways of the world. But you can make an effort to live biblically. That is how the process of sanctification works - learning how to obey God, how to listen for his commands in your life. It is reading the Scripture and allowing it to soak into you. It is understanding the requirements of God's commandments and then gradually, day by day, in large ways and small, allowing that understanding to control the actions of your life. . .
If I had to pick the one thing. . . that has caused the most failure in obeying God, it would be that we figure God's time is our Bible study, our prayer time, the meeting with our prayer group, and Sunday morning church service. That's just not true. God's time is every moment of our lives. Bible study and church simply prepare us for the rest of the moments of our lives. . . We don't put him on and take him off like a suit of clothes. . . If we would "wear" him all day long, we would discover obedience becoming a reflex reaction.
-From "The Quest for Obedience" by Charles Colson in Practical Christianity; part of The Inspirational Study Bible: New Century Version by Max Lucado
Does obedience to God come easier - or harder - at certain times of the week? In certain places? Among certain people? In order to obey God faithfully, you may need to make changes in your heart and in your life. Make a change and declare a new start today.
But Samuel answered, "What pleases the Lord more: burnt offerings and sacrifices or obedience to his voice? It is better to obey than to sacrifice. It is better to listen to God than to offer the fat of sheep. -1 Samuel 15:22
To be a Christian is, in a sense, to be a man without a country. If you truly are obedient to Christ - if you take the Scriptures to heart and attempt to live them - you will inevitably come into conflict with the world. You belong to no one but Christ, while those in the world give themselves to people, possessions, institutions, and idols other than to Christ. To be a Christian is to stand apart and yet to remain within - to dare to be different. You look at everything through the prism of Scripture, and things look different when viewed biblically.
Success in the world means power, influence, money, prestige. But in the Christian world, it means pleasing God. This quest for obedience may lead you to do things that are wholly contrary to what the world wants and rewards. . .
Obeying his commandments means reading and understanding Scripture, then determining that you are going to live exactly as Scripture teaches. I don't believe anybody can do that, because it is almost impossible not to be caught up every day in the ways of the world. But you can make an effort to live biblically. That is how the process of sanctification works - learning how to obey God, how to listen for his commands in your life. It is reading the Scripture and allowing it to soak into you. It is understanding the requirements of God's commandments and then gradually, day by day, in large ways and small, allowing that understanding to control the actions of your life. . .
If I had to pick the one thing. . . that has caused the most failure in obeying God, it would be that we figure God's time is our Bible study, our prayer time, the meeting with our prayer group, and Sunday morning church service. That's just not true. God's time is every moment of our lives. Bible study and church simply prepare us for the rest of the moments of our lives. . . We don't put him on and take him off like a suit of clothes. . . If we would "wear" him all day long, we would discover obedience becoming a reflex reaction.
-From "The Quest for Obedience" by Charles Colson in Practical Christianity; part of The Inspirational Study Bible: New Century Version by Max Lucado
Does obedience to God come easier - or harder - at certain times of the week? In certain places? Among certain people? In order to obey God faithfully, you may need to make changes in your heart and in your life. Make a change and declare a new start today.
But Samuel answered, "What pleases the Lord more: burnt offerings and sacrifices or obedience to his voice? It is better to obey than to sacrifice. It is better to listen to God than to offer the fat of sheep. -1 Samuel 15:22
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