May 20, 2024

GOD’S WORD FOR TODAY:

“Find out what pleases the Lord. And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people. Pray also for me, that whenever I speak, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should.” (Ephesians 5.10; Ephesians 6.18-20)

REFLECTION ON GOD’S WORD:

As we consider Paul’s words to the Faith in Christ Community in Ephesus, the challenge to “Find out what pleases the Lord” is critical to our own life. For the Jews, what was taught as “pleasing the Lord” was a steadfast adherence to the Law of Moses and later to the Law of the Pharisees as the “Law of Moses” was expanded from ten rules of righteousness to six hundred and thirty-seven check boxes. What was happening was the externalizing of the Law so that all appearances of being God’s people was “undeniable.” I don’t know, but the option of six hundred and thirty-seven opportunities to get it wrong gives me a lot of options to get it wrong. Of course, I think for those who held to that kind of thinking were motivated by the means of correcting the problem. What was that correction? It was, of course, paying temple taxes and offering sacrifices to cover the multitude of sins. If we believed in that today, the sky would be black with sacrificial smoke polluting the air when it was intended that fragrant offerings were to be made. There is a reason why God declared “I am not satisfied with your sacrifices nor do I accept them any longer.” God’s word on this is the essential beginning of Isaiah’s prophetic work and we hear the echoes of it in Hosea and the Psalms. If animal sacrifices and temple taxes do not please God, then what does?

It should not surprise you that the answer was not a New Testament revelation. When God spoke through His prophets of Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel and Hosea about His disdain for the sacrifices, it was all about the heart and the intent of those who offered them. Going through the sacrificial motions did not demonstrate the integrity of the heart, mind, soul and spirit of the people who did them. The system was broken and unacceptable because it had lost its meaning, purpose and function. It no longer showed contrition (repentance for ones past sins leading to leading a more righteous life) but capitulation to a sense of hopelessness with a need for survival. The call for a “clean heart and a right spirit” was not intended to do away with the sacrifices but to challenge the belief in and intention of the sacrifices. It wasn’t that God hated sacrifices but that he hated “their” sacrifices. They were ineffectual and dishonest. As I remember a phrase from my high school days “it was all show and no go.” Such behavior and mindset was not pleasing to God.

Now Paul is asking Jew and Gentile to look for a different model of believing and behaving that was linked to their future and not their past. In both “cultures,” the defining of happiness or pleasing was based on self and not others. It could not be about “what makes ME happy” or “what pleases ME” that is the defining character of the Christ community of faith. It really wasn’t about pleasing Jesus. It was about pleasing God. The best example of that intentional purpose and function was evident in the gospel of Jesus as the Christ. He was fully committed to “doing the will of My Father in heaven.” God’s will was about loving, nurturing, saving and dwelling with His people all the days of their lives. Living a Christ-like life became the goal and aim of all who believed in Jesus as the Christ. The instruction of the gospel of Christ was the primer for a life that resulted in true happiness and was “pleasing to God.” It wasn’t about stroking God’s ego and finding ways to make God happy. It was about relishing the life of being in God’s presence and preserving that life for all those within your sphere of influence.

As we look at those closing verses of Ephesians, chapter six, we will see those valued predictors which create a life that is pleasing to God and functional in fostering a life in others that does the same: prayer, alertness, discipling and fearlessness. We will reflect more on those this week and I look forward to sharing those reflections with you in that same valued desire to please God.

TODAY’S PRAYER IN RESPONSE TO GOD’S WORD:

Father, before we were conceived in the womb, You had already formed us in Your love and by Your Spirit brought us into being. Each one of us is blessed with the opportunity of doing right, being good and producing the fruit of the Spirit so that others may be fed the truth of that same love so that the two will become one. It is our soul’s sincere desire to embrace the oneness You have in mind that we would know that we are Your people and that You are our God. Lead us in that discovery of the truth and the manifestation of that love for us all. In Jesus’ name, we pray. AMEN.