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Obedience

So last weekend I went with my girlfriend Bethany to get her hair cut. While I was waiting for it to finish I was reading the Bible on my phone, specifically 1 Samuel 15. In the passage I was reading God was commanding Saul to attack the Amalekites and to leave nothing alive or to take any spoils. Saul destroys the Amalekites but keeps the animals for sacrifices. God tells Samuel to confront Saul about it and that leads to this verse, 15:22
"So Samuel said : "Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, As in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, And to heed than the fat of rams."

These verses ring true today just as much as they did thousands of years ago when Saul disobeyed God. How many times do we think that we are obeying God because in our minds we are doing the right thing? (Just as Saul thought it would be okay to leave the animals alive so he could sacrifice them later)

This reminds me of the people in the church who think that if they get there early to set up tables, and stay late to tear down, or the people who think that if they give up X amount of dollars in the offerings then that would somehow glorify God, while the whole time they are not obeying the Word of God when it tells them to love their neighbor, or to forgive the person who wronged them when they were younger.

I think many of these problems stem from the fact that we cannot follow the Word of God if we do not know the Word of God. If we are not meditating on it daily and studying it, then how will we know what it says?

I remember I was watching a show once, it was your typical teenage drama show. (My sister had it on) In this show, the 'Christian' girl was convinced that it was okay to have sex with her boyfriend because God would want her to be happy and that would make her happy. That is a completely (and pardon my language) stupid way to think about faith. "If this makes me happy then it will make God happy". I have met lots of people that think that same way.

God calls us to radical obedience AND sacrifice. The Bible goes as far to say that not obeying is comparable to witchcraft. Sacrifice alone is not what God wants, he wants our whole being, our obedience, our life.


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