Pleasing God (3)
BIBLE READING: PROVERBS 16:7; ROMANS 8:8; HEBREWS 11:6
“WHEN GOD TAKES PLEASURE IN ANYONE’S WAY, HE CAUSES THEIR ENEMIES TO MAKE PEACE WITH THEM”(PROVERBS 16:7)
My spirit has taken me back to this topic again this week. This is such a powerful Scripture. It is a “When God says YES, no one can say NO” Scripture. My enemies will have no choice but to make peace with me if God takes pleasure in me. There is no maybe in this matter; this is a truth you can make your boast in. I am studying the Book of 2 Kings at the moment and it is amazing to see how God causes things to happen to achieve His purpose. As we saw last week, when He was pleased with Solomon He kept his enemies away but when He found iniquity and wickedness in him, he raised enemies to attack him. As I continued to study the Book of Kings, I realised, for everyone who came against Israel or Judah, God allowed it when they sinned. Those who decided to come against them without God’s permission either retreated or were destroyed. God was always at the steering wheel.
As I continued to study, I realised, this is what God is still doing today. All He wants from us is to obey His commandments and He will take pleasure in us. All the laws He gave to the Israelites are summed up into the two commandments He gave us in the New Testament, so we are to keep the same laws today. The difference is, instead of all the sacrifices the Israelites had to do in those days for the remission of their sins, God made His Son, that One perfect Sacrifice for us and once you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. No more multiple sacrifices, all sins are forgiven and you enter into a new relationship with God. The Israelites had to go to the Temple to seek God’s face and worship Him because only a chosen few (The High Priest from the tribe of the Levites) had the right to go into the Holy of Holies to meet with God. The Levites were the only ones who served in God’s temple and taught the people the laws of God. Today, because of Jesus Christ’s death, resurrection and ascension into heaven, we can now go boldly to the throne of our Gracious God ourselves. As His children, we have God Himself living with and in us, in the Person of the Holy Spirit, Who comes into our lives to guide and teach us the ways of God. We have a guidebook (The Bible) and a Guide (the Holy Spirit), the more we study the guidebook and follow the instructions of the Guide we will forever be pleasing to God. The Bible tells us, only the Holy Spirit knows the mind of God and so only He can guide us into all truth, this is probably why the Bible says God can only be worshipped in spirit and in truth.
Hebrews 11:6says, “And it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to Him must believe that God exists and that He rewards those who sincerely seek Him.” (NLT)and
Romans 10:9-10says, “If you openly declare that Jesus Is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by openly declaring your faith that you are saved.” (NLT).
So I can conclude from Romans 10:9-10that Faithis declaring that Jesus Christ is Lord and I am made right with God, if I believe that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead.
Hebrews 11:1says “Now faith brings our hopes into reality and becomes the foundation needed to acquire the things we long for. It is the evidence required to prove what is still unseen” (TPT).I love this version of the Scripture. If you replace faith with the Lordship of Jesus Christ, we have, “Now the Lordship of Jesus Christ brings our hopes into reality and becomes the foundation needed to acquire the things we long for. It is the evidence required to prove what is unseen.”I honestly don’t know any better way to define Faith, but the Lordship of Jesus Christ.
So going back to Hebrews 11:6,I can then say, it is impossible to please God if I don’t declare Jesus Christ as my Lord and Saviour, and have Him rule over my life. As a born again child of the Most High God, the only way I can please God and have Him make sure my enemies remain silent and powerless forever is for me to have Jesus Christ as my Lord and Saviour, not just in words but by my deeds. I must live like Him, do His will and obey His commandments. All these He has made easy for me by giving me the Gift of the Holy Spirit to be with me and live in me, guiding me in all I do here on earth. Not only that, I have His Word, which is described as my Light, I see by the Word, hear by the Word and live by the Word. I am to study the Word, meditate and obey it so the things of this world do not control me. I am to feed on the Word of God and the more I do this, the less I will not be controlled by the lust of the flesh.
Armed with the Word of God and the Holy Spirit, pleasing God will become natural to me. I thank God that He has made allowances for my mistakes (1 John 1:8-10)and I know His covering over me can never be removed in the mighty name of Jesus Christ…Amen
UNDER GRACE UNDER MERCY