How to Please God 4 of 4

Repentance is nothing more than a change of direction.  To repent literally means to turn around and to go the other way.  

Well if we say that we believe in “heaven and hell”, if we say that we believe in “God and the devil” . . . 

if we say we that believe in “judgment after death”, but if “this belief” does not cause A CHANGE within our lives or within our heart, then what does such a belief profit us?  

James tells us that it will not profit us at all because without repentance, without a change, this is a “dead faith” which does not have the power to save that a living faith has.

        John 3: 16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever 
         believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

        17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through 
        him might be saved.

        18 He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, 
        because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

The faith that is mentioned here in this passage does not refer to a dead faith without repentance like we have been talking about (where is the profit in saying we believe, but not living like we believe) . . . but

rather John 3:16 refers to a living faith that has the POWER to save our soul.  It is possible to believe that Jesus died on the cross and go to hell with that belief.

You see saving faith is a faith that first brings a change to our heart and this change within spills over to produce a change in our lives “without”.

If we believe that Jesus died on the cross, then this belief should burden our heart (affect us within).   

To believe that Jesus died on the cross for our sins should make us feel bad (in our heart/mind), it should make us experience guilt (as we struggle within), and this guilt should result in REPENTANCE (a change of direction within) which has the power to change a dead faith into a living faith and save our eternal soul.   

There is a passage of scripture that actually defines the effect of a faith that is empowered by genuine repentance . . . 

We read in 2 Corinthians 5 about how things change after we are saved.  The phrase “all things become new” actually tells us that NEW THINGS appear.  

After we are saved, after we have repented, after we are facing a new direction we are able to see things that we could not see before we repented.  

One of the first things that faith, repentance and salvation will allow us to see that we have never seen before . . . is LOVE.

        2Co 5:17 Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; 
         behold, all things are become new.

Now when we speak of not being able to see love BEFORE we repent toward God, we are talking about turning our backs upon only living our lives to “get what we want” in life.  

I am talking about living with the attitude “I don’t care if the money is gone when it is time for others to get theirs, I just want to make sure that I am able to get mine.   The love that we have for self - is NOT Christian love at all.

It is only natural to love those who love us in return, but it is not natural to love those who mistreat us and seek to get ahead at our expense.

James 2: 14 What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith (without repentance) save him?

15 If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food,

16 And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit? (what good is a love that only comforts those who love us first)

17 Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.

And now we get to the concept of Christian love as opposed to worldly or natural love.   

If a brother or sister is in need, and instead of supplying that need, we just tell them that we hope they get a good meal and that we hope that they are able to stay warm at night, what good have we done?  

This is a message that sounds good, but without food and blankets to accompany our words, there is no profit at all to those who are cold and hungry and neither is there any profit to us, for just talking and not doing.

This is an example of talking ABOUT love but it is NOT exercising love.   

We have not fulfilled the great commandment just because we have talked about what SHOULD be done.   

The brother in need is still cold and hungry and we have not given any proof of love, we have only given proof that our heart it cold and that our spirit is hungry for the righteousness of God.   

Hopefully we can see from this example that a dead faith has no more power to please God, than a dead love has to comfort those who are in need.

       James 1: 22 But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.

       23 For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his
       natural   face in a glass:

       24 For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of 
       man he was.

      25 But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a 
       forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.

       26 If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own
       heart, this man's religion is vain.

       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.

       1Jo 4:8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.

       1Jo 4:16 And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that
       dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him.

To be a doer of The Word - is allow Christian LOVE to make us different than the world around us.  To be a doer of The Word is to see a reflection of our lives in The Bible - and when we see the reflection of sin in our lives 

We BELIEVE God's Word concerning the condition of our lives and we then REPENT of the sin that our study of God's Word has revealed to us.

To do otherwise is to be a forgetful hearer as we do not allow the the study of God's Word to have any affect on our lives - as we spend our lives practicing religion only to worship God in vain.

Series How to please God 3 of 4

So of all the commandments of God, the most important one is associated with LOVE . . .

Step one toward pleasing God begins when we develop a proper fear of God.  It requires faith for us to to fear a God that we cannot prove exists.  But properly respecting God gives proof that such faith is genuine.

Step two is taken as a result of this first step.  Because we fear God, because we believe in punishment, we endeavor to "keep" His commandments. This is not entirely negative, because if "we believe" in punishment, then we also believe in rewards.  

I do want to point out that it is not proper to "obey God" just because we hope that God will reward us with wealth or other things that we desire to make our present life easier.  

The reward that I refer to - are all of the (intangible) benefits that are associated with an increased love of God in our heart.

And the final step in this equation is HOW we keep - protect - preserve and obey His commandments.  

That final step is taken because we have enough faith to fear God and to actually be concerned about what God thinks concerning our lives.  Our fear of God motivates us to "search for a way to please Him" and it also motivates us to learn about what we need to avoid in life that might make Him angry.

So step three is actually "putting into practice" the most important of God's commandments . . .

. . . of every commandment that we find in The Bible, have you ever wondered which one of them was the most important commandment of all?  Well it just so happens that this very question is answered for us in a direct and ‘straight forward way’ in The Bible.  

Let’s read in Matthew 22:35 about a man that literally asked Jesus this exact question.

Matthew 22: 35 Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying,

36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?

37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.

38 This is the first and great commandment.

39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.

40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

The gist of these verses is simply this: It does not matter how religious we are, it does not matter how many good works that we accomplish, it does not matter how much money we give to the poor (you get the idea) . . . 

if we do not possess love in our heart, then as a Christian, we are a complete and total failure. We know this to be true because of what we read in verse 40) On these two commandments hang ALL the law (of Moses) and the prophets (remainder of the sacred writings).

Another verse that comes to mind is one that is often overlooked in regard to those who seek to please God by excessive involvement in religion instead of seeking to please Him as He desires to be pleased. 

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. 

Now the first thing that comes to mind here is that The Bible does not tell us that without good works or without involvement in some type of religion that it is impossible to please Him, but we are told directly without any source of confusion that faith is the ONLY thing that can please God. 

Now I want to point out that simply saying the words “I believe in God” without any evidence in our lives to support those words does not count for faith. 

James 2: 14 What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him?

15 If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food,

16 And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?

17 Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.

The point here is that we can say that we believe in God, but live as though we do not believe in God at all, as we rebel against His will without any regard (or without any godly fear) concerning the day of Judgment. 

Heb 9:27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the     judgment:

Having no fear of “judgment” is simply an example of a dead faith.  It is not real.  It is not genuine.  It serves only to deceive, because God is not pleased with it at all.   

Did you notice how James began this passage?  What does it profit any man if we say that we have faith, but our life gives no evidence of that faith?   

Can just saying that we believe in God save our soul, or must there be something else to accompany (or give power to) “faith” which is able to bring salvation?  The thing that is missing here making this a “dead faith” is the concept of repentance.

We will conclude this series with the next lesson in which we will discuss the concept of repentance and what form it should take in our lives when it is practiced instead of just talked about.

Until the next post - God bless . . .

Series How to please God 2 of 4

The second step that every man takes toward “pleasing God” is when he endeavors to 2) keep His commandments.  

Now in this lesson, rather than list all of the many commandments of God in order to see how each one of us rates in regard to our obedience to them, I want us to consider the most important one of God’s commandments.   

But first of all, let’s see what the scriptures teach us about being able to keep most of God’s commandments, but failing in just a few of them.

James 2: 8 If ye fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, ye do well:

9 But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors.

10 For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.

11 For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law.

Notice verse 8) if you fulfill the royal law which means that in order to do this, that you must love others even as you love your own self . . . and if accomplished, this is a good thing.  

But then James qualifies what fulfilling this commandment actually means in the reality of everyday life.  If you think that you have reached the point where you are able to love your neighbor as thyself, consider that you have failed, if you ye have respect of persons.

To have respect of persons refers to showing “partiality” or giving favored treatment to some but withholding it from others.  What this means is that we have respect of persons when we treat our friends better than we treat those who are not our friends. 

If we favor our fellow Razorback fans with tickets on the fifty yard line, while we only give “end zone” tickets to those who are not Razorback fans, then we are showing partiality and

we are having respect of persons and according to James 2:9 this is a sin.  And because of this we have not really kept (to the fullest extent possible) the commandment which tells us to love our neighbor even as we love ourselves.

Verse 10) tells us that if we were able to keep the whole law (which is not really possible, but if it were possible) and if we failed in only ONE of God’s many commandments 

then we would still not be able to say that we had “kept” God’s commandments, but we would be guilty of disobedience just like those who had kept all of them except two.  

Consider the state trooper and how useless it would be when we were pulled over for speeding to explain that even though we were speeding, there were many other laws that we were obeying.   

Yes, I was speeding, but I was wearing my seat belt.  

Yes, I was speeding but I was not following too close.   

Yes, I was speeding but I was doing everything else according to the letter of the law.

Now if the situation described above actually occurred, would your obedience to all of the traffic laws except the speed limit law only, would this in any way make you “not guilty” of speeding so that (in the eyes of the law) you would be except from getting a ticket; of course not.  

Well this is exactly what James is telling us in the passage above.

11 For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law.

For he that said, do not speed also said, do not follow too close, use your turn signals properly and come to a complete stop at a stop sign.  Now if you are guilty of speeding, yet if you do not follow too close, if you use your turn signals properly and if you always come to a complete stop at a stop sign, you are still a TRANSGRESSOR of the law.

So before we continue with the next lesson, in which we will define in no uncertain terms, the most important commandment that God has ever given to mankind.  

I want us to consider {that in light of what we have read in James 2: 8-11} that even though we honestly try to “keep” His commandments, because we cannot keep them all, we have become guilty of breaking God’s Law.  And the result of breaking God’s Law, is that we are in danger of His judgment against sin.

Romans 3:20 Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.

So of all the commandments of God, the most important one is . . . See my next post, until then God bless.