It's that time a year again that I start my Christmas shopping for others. The problem is, I'm really bad at picking at gifts for some people. I have gotten to the point that I have given up on surprising my wife, I just tell her to tell me plainly what she wants. That way I know she'll be happy with what I give her, because it's exactly what she asked for. Well...why do so many call Jesus Lord and yet not do what he asks of them? We presume that we know better than what God has already said, but God is not interested in what we think he wants, he's interested with us doing what he already told us to do. Want to please God? Obey him.
#SetYourMindAbovePodcast
It's that time a year again that I start my Christmas shopping for others. The problem is, I'm really bad at picking at gifts for some people. I have gotten to the point that I have given up on surprising my wife, I just tell her to tell me plainly what she wants. That way I know she'll be happy with what I give her, because it's exactly what she asked for. Well...why do so many call Jesus Lord and yet not do what he asks of them? We presume that we know better than what God has already said, but God is not interested in what we think he wants, he's interested with us doing what he already told us to do. Want to please God? Obey him.
#SetYourMindAbovePodcast
Welcome back to all of our listeners! I’m BJ Sipe, and you’re listening to the Set Your Mind Above podcast – where everyday ordinary events teach us extraordinary eternal truths. I’m so glad that you’ve tuned in today, I am excited to share my life and my faith with you, and I sure hope that you’ll do the same with me along the way.
It’s getting to that time of year again that many people are starting to think about what they are going to get for their friends and family for Christmas. I understand that there are different opinions surrounding celebrating Christmas among different Christian groups, and I hope you know that whether you abstain or celebrate the holiday that I support your decision as both do so in an effort to honor God. As for my family, we are and always have been avid fans of Christmas. Pretty soon we’ll be getting our tree down from the attic along with the rest of the decorations to start to transformation from fall décor to winter décor around our house. Nat King Cole, Bing Crosby, Andy Williams, and Burl Ives will be on repeat through all their classic Christmas albums, and before too long presents will start to accumulate underneath the tree. And now we have reached my confession regarding giving presents around Christmas: I’m really not that good at it. It’s not that I don’t love giving presents, in facts Christmas shopping for others is one of my favorite things to do. But for me, some people are just really hard to shop for. The hardest people to shop for are the ones that don’t tell you what they want. They just respond back with the very polite, “Oh, I don’t need anything, don’t worry about it” response when you ask them what they want, leaving you to guess. Many times my wife is like that, and so I’m left buying her something that I think she’ll like, but my track record is not fantastic. I remember one time I got her this shawl thing I was sure she would just die for, and she about did when she saw it because it was so hideous. Don’t get me wrong, she was very polite about it, but I could tell. I’ve now gotten to the point that I just tell her to text me a link or a list to what she wants, and insist that she at least gives me one or two things to choose from. I never wanted her to do that before because I thought it ruined the “element of surprise,” but the older I’ve gotten I’ve realized I would much rather give her something that I know she wants because she’s asked for it than surprise her with something that quite honestly I have no idea whether she’d enjoy or not. So, about an hour ago she sent me a text saying, “Here’s a Christmas idea for you since you were having a hard time,” with a link to some earrings from Made by Mary. They are these beautiful gold hoop earrings, which she specified “I like the large and medium sizes!” Her text was super clear, there is absolutely no mistaking what she wants; and I really like it that way. I can know come Christmas morning as she opens a jewelry box which she’ll pretend to not know the contents of that she will love what is inside. Now, lets imagine for a moment that she sent me this link, she showed me what she wanted and even what size she wanted, but come Christmas morning she opens up a jewelry box and doesn’t find these earrings. Imagine instead that she pulls out this strange turquoise layered necklace – something she’s never worn or asked for once in her life. As she held it up, I say something like, “I know you asked for the earrings, but I just knew that you’d like this better.” Well…no. If she had, she would have told me, wouldn’t she? There is an easy, surefire way of knowing that the gift I am giving to my wife is going to please her: when I just simply get her what she asked for. Well, Merry Christmas honey, if you get a package in the mail from Made by Mary in the next week or two, just pretend you never saw it.
We’re not here to talk about giving gifts to each other on Christmas, but I do want to ask us this question today: what kind of gifts do we offer up to God? I want us to consider two passages of Scripture to begin with: the first is the words of the prophet Samuel to King Saul, and the second is the words of our Lord Jesus. Let’s begin in 1 Samuel 15:22-23, “And 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 listen than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has also rejected you from being king.” To give us some context, God had commanded Saul to make war against the Amalekites (a wicked nation) and devote everything to destruction. Instead, Saul & the people pounced upon the spoil, the best of the herds they had, and justified doing so because they were going to offer some of them up as a sacrifice to God. Though God had clearly told Saul what he wanted, Saul acted presumptuously and did something quite different thinking that God would like it better. The words of Samuel teach us clearly otherwise: to obey is better than to sacrifice. God was not interested in Saul’s gifts, he was interested in Saul very simply doing what he has asked of him to do. God could not have been more clear with his instructions, therefore it was not that God was ambiguous or had not communicated his desires, it was that Saul thought he knew better. This brings us to our second text today that is found in Luke 6:46-49, where Jesus says, “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do what I tell you? Everyone who comes to me and hears my words and does them, I will show you what he is like: he is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when a flood arose, the stream broke against that house and could not shake it, because it had been well built. But the one who hears and does not do them is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. When the stream broke against it, immediately it fell, and the ruin of that house was great.” I believe this is a great warning to our generation. There are a great many people who profess Jesus as their Lord and claim to be Christians, and yet they do not do the things that God has called them to do. There are so many applications that we can make to ourselves in our lives, but let me just offer up a few. There are many churches that want to introduce all kinds of other elements into worship in order to attract more worshipers, to the point that worship almost becomes a festival. We have shopping in the foyer, game rooms, gymnasiums, and big rock concerts that we all call a part of worship. Many justify these things because we do them for God, but let me ask you, did God ask for these things? In the first century when Christ established his church, his desire for its practice and organization is made very clear. He’s already told us what he wants, why do we presume and act as though we know better? Why do we feel the need to attract everyone to Jesus with everything except Jesus & his gospel? How cheap we have made the gospel, the church, and the requests of our Lord. There are others who go the other way, and claim that they are perfectly acceptable to God without joining themselves to a local church in order to serve & worship him there because they have “a personal relationship with Jesus.” My friends, you cannot claim to have a personal relationship with Jesus when you reject what he has asked you to do. Jesus died for his church, he spilled his blood in order to establish it, and when we claim “we have no need of it,” we are essentially spitting upon the cross of Christ. Here is the point – if you want to know that what you are doing is truly pleasing and acceptable to God, here’s how you can know: just do what he says. Jesus is not interested in what we think he wants, he very simply wants us to what he’s already said. May we never be guilty of the sin of presumption like Saul, and may each of us truly make Jesus our Lord through being obedient to him.
Thank you so much for listening to today’s episode. Tune in, Tuesday-Fridays, as a new podcast episode will be uploaded each day. Also, be sure to follow the Facebook page for the Set Your Mind Above podcast for future announcements and video sessions. As you have the opportunity, share these thoughts with your friends and family, and share with me what important lessons you are learning from every day, ordinary events. Until next time know that I love you, that God loves you, and may we all each and every day set our minds above.