Pleasing God

Without faith it is impossible to please God because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. Hebrews 11: 6

I want to please God.  However this is not because I am fearful of displeasing Him. I’m not. If we are worried about displeasing God, it is usually because we fear punishment when we get things wrong but God is not going to punish us even if we are disobedient.  All the punishment for our sin was taken by Jesus on the cross. We do not have to fear it any longer. 

For sure - disobedience hampers our relationship with God but it does not terminate it even temporarily.  God does not want us to walk in sin and he will do all he can to help us repent and ask for forgiveness but not because he is waiting to punish us but because sin is harmful to us and our relationship with him.

Despite all their shortcomings, the only time Jesus even rebuked the disciples was after he had risen from the dead and then it was ‘for their lack of faith and stubborn refusal to believe those who had seen him after he had risen’ (Mark 16: 14). The next reported words though were ‘Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation.’ In order for them to do this effectively they needed to believe that he had risen from the dead. Their unbelief was stopping this happening.

Unbelief is the greatest hindrance to a powerful, effective Kingdom life because it robs us of faith.  Faith pleases God so to walk with God by faith, we must let God do whatever is necessary to root out unbelief in our lives. 

 Unbelief makes God measure up to our experience and understanding.  If I can reason and understand all that God is doing, he is very small indeed. I am resolved that I will not let my Christian life depend on my experience but on what the Word of God says. If my experience does not measure up then it has to change not the Word of God. If I pray for the sick and they are not healed, then I must persevere till they are, not give up.

Years ago we were not seeing the breakthrough in our finances that we believed the Word of God promises us. We took our wallets, cheque book, cards, bank statements and prayed over them breaking the hold of lack, insufficiency and debt in our lives and calling forth the promised blessings of God. There was not an instantaneous break through but there was a change and we gradually started to prosper. We made our experience line up with the Word of God not vice versa.

I know I have hardly started to experience even a tiny fraction of some of the things in the Bible but I must persevere till I do. I must resist the temptation to give up when it becomes hard and instead carry on till I get the victory. 

I want to please God and so I must walk by faith.