It used to be that, when I considered how I might please God, a list of highly religious sounding activities would arise in my mind. Read the bible. Pray for an hour daily, preferably before the sun rises. Share the message of Christ with many people. Give your money to missionaries. Go to church every time the doors are opened. While it is certain that these are activities that might please God, my attitude and perception were shrunken because I assumed that, having accomplished these tasks, God would most definitely beam with delight upon his dutiful boy. Looking back to those early years, I think it is possible that doing those things falsely reassured me and proudly attempted to evidence to others that I was living my life as a God-pleaser. I never knew that a life which pleases God might look very different…as different as are God’s unique children.
In the film Chariots of Fire there is a memorable scene involving Eric Liddell and his sister, Jenny. She is chiding him for what she regards as his divided loyalty between his athletics and his commitment to Christ. She reminds him that God made him for Himself. He replies: “Aye, Jenny, I know, but He also made me fast, and when I run, I feel His pleasure.” For us, this may not be athletics. It may be accounting or selling or teaching or nursing or mothering. In the latter case, this would allow a mother to declare with conviction: “And when I make the lunches, I feel His pleasure.” – Alistair Begg
I’m learning each year on a greater level that it is not our religious tasks and disciplines which please God as much as it is our wholesale awareness of Him and our heart’s awed devotion to Him. “Aye, Jenny, He made me fast, and when I run, I feel His pleasure.” What a simple and humble approach to a life being lived for the glory of God. Have you thought recently on how God has made you and how you might submit that innate wiring of your persona to Him for His glory? While some sing and some preach and some intercede and some pioneer the Gospel in unknown areas…some were never intended to do any of those things. Some were made to be mathematicians and architects while others are artists or poets. I know some godly men who are construction workers and others who are attorneys who serve alongside one another in both church related activities and family endeavors. My heart is often moved by Christian homemakers who have refused society’s attempts to squeeze them into its deformed definition of success. These wife-mothers are rarely applauded outside of their family yet they are likely making an impact that will outlast time in the lives of children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Other sisters of the faith were never called to be mothers and wives so they pour their redeemed lives into caring for the sick and lonely and emotionally weak. With an awareness of God and an intentional living unto His glory all life activities can be sanctified and pleasing to His infinite heart. You see, friends, there is no need for a singular template to lay over us all when considering how we might please God. Note this: it is much more about being than it is about doing.
There is no doubt in my mind that I was placed on this earth to communicate. “Aye, Jenny, God made me for words and, when I communicate, I feel His pleasure.” Perhaps, knowing this prioritized purpose for my life, it would serve me well to give myself to it more fully than ever before. It may be a profitable thing for me to put away my secondary checklist of “325 Things Which Should Please The Lord” and begin to emulate two of my heroes, King David & the Apostle Paul, who each said, “This one thing have I desired…this one thing I do…” (Psalm 27:4 & Philippians 3:13). This…one…thing. Perhaps you might consider what He has made you for and, once discerning that, you might find great delight in giving yourself over to it as you allow other lesser things to pass away.
Imagine that! Your delight in being who Christ redeemed you to be. Imagine something even greater: His delight in that very same thing.
Some will read what you’ve written and not get it. They will feel confused – even afraid – of the implied freedom in your words. But some will get it and will be encouraged as I am. Mass religion (regardless of denomination) requires homogeniety to survive; individualization can’t be tolerated because it sucks the breath out of the uniformity that mass anything needs. This blog reminds me of something that one of my heroes said: “Never make a principle out of your own experience; always let God be as creative with others as He has been with you.” – Oswald Chambers. “God has made me to think and when I help others think rightly, I feel His pleasure.”