Obedience Over Sacrifice

This podcast talks about how we blur the lines between obedience and sacrifice. We need to be aware that we are being obedient to show alignment to God versus sacrificing to get God to align with us. God always values our obedience over sacrifice. God always values His relationship with us over any ritual.

Transcript

Hello everybody and welcome to today's episode of the podcast Help My Unbelief.

So first let me explain.

Help My Unbelief was put together because I like to talk about practical applications of biblical principles and talk about some of the challenging aspects of being a Christian.

So that's what Help My Unbelief is about.

Now of course this podcast is open to everyone.

I'm just making everybody aware that I focus from a Christian perspective.

So let's get into today's episode.

So today's episode is about obedience over sacrifice.

That is the title.

Now I know that sounds a little weird because you know some of us as Christians we recognize that obeying God often involves some form of sacrifice whether we're sacrificing popularity or sacrificing whatever worldly standard in order to be obedient to God.

And so we know or we feel that in order to be obedient to God what we're sacrificing is our perspective in order to align with a divine perspective.

So I want to clarify immediately what I'm referring to here when I'm talking about obedience over sacrifice.

So I'm referring to obedience to God versus sacrificing to God.

Yeah I'm sure that's as clear as mud right.

So what I want to focus on is that when we're walking with God we tend to blur the lines between being obedient to God and sacrificing to God.

Now to try to clarify that distinction obeying God is following a directive that you have received from God.

It is aligning with God's nature or like I said very specifically something that God has directed you to do.

You're doing it.

That is obedience to God obeying God.

Sacrificing to God on the other hand is more of a symbol of reverence and deference to God.

So essentially we're giving something up where we're making a sacrifice in order to demonstrate our allegiance to God.

So we have both things we have obedience to God obeying God and sacrificing to God.

Obeying God meaning that we are following a very specific directive that he's given to us as individuals and also obedience to God being that alignment with God's nature.

And then there's sacrificing to God which is more of a symbol of deference or reverence and it's something that we do in order to demonstrate that we are aligned or have an allegiance to God.

So the point of this podcast and as we continue to discuss we're going to see that even though obedience may involve some sacrifice,

Sacrifice doesn't always mean obedient.

Yep so this is going to be a little controversial might step on a few toes but all for our elevation.

So I want to reference you back to the story of King Saul.

Now Saul's story King Saul story begins in 1st Samuel the 12th chapter if you want to go back and read the entire account for yourself.

But specifically I want to refer to an incident that is documented in 1st Samuel 15th chapter where Saul,

King Saul is asked to utterly destroy the Amalekites.

So Samuel who was the religious leader of the time has heard from God and is now talking to King Saul saying God is directing you to go and destroy the Amalekites.

Now the instructions are very specific.

Everything must be destroyed every person man woman and child every animal all the belongings must be burned everything all everything about the Amalekites needs to be destroyed.

This is the message that Saul received.

Now Saul goes in he goes to battle with the Amalekites he does gain the victory he does beat them he does he destroys every person he does every man woman and child he does except he saved the king.

He goes through and he does destroy every animal every sheep every ox every calf every lamb except the best quality ones or the ones that they determined to be best quality.

He destroyed every belonging every possession of the Amalekites except what was determined quote unquote determined to be good.

So and but and destroyed everything that was considered to be despised and worthless.

So let me let me clarify what happened here.

Saul was directed by God through Samuel to utterly destroy the Amalekites and even though Saul technically did the job he saved the life of the king he preserved the life of all the best animals and he collected all of the best linens objects money what have you but he did destroy 99.

99999% of the population and he got rid of everything that was deemed to be worthless and and despised but but he saved these various things and on his way back from the battle he even set up a monument Saul set up a monument to himself marking the significance of the victory of the day they have destroyed the Amalekites the Amalekites who were enemies of Israel.

Now Samuel hears from God and finds out that Samuel Saul did not quite do what God had directed him to do and so when Samuel goes to Saul and says hey you were supposed to follow this directive and Saul said yeah I did that I sure did I did everything that God told me to do.

So Samuel said then what's all of this who's this guy what's with all the animals what's with this pile of of spoil over here these treasures and Saul says ah well I saved all of these things because we're going to go and make this grand sacrifice to God and here is Samuel's response which is the the crux the center point of this broadcast.

Samuel's response found in 1st Samuel 15th chapter the 22nd and the 23rd verses.

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.

Now we can all sit back and look at Saul's story look at this whole account and we can judge him quite harshly and critically.

We can say well clearly he had an ulterior motive right?

Clearly as king you know he wanted the notoriety and how cool would he look coming back home triumphant utterly destroying this people and capturing the king.

The king is his personal prisoner because you can't be a king if you don't have any more people.

So that that's the coolest prize is it not?

How cool would it look for for Saul to parade this huge herd of animals to sacrifice and this grand feast that would result afterwards how cool would Saul look?

He would look legendary.

I went and I followed God and I had this huge victory here's the king who is now disgraced and I'm sure Saul planned a grand execution for that king of the Amalekites and now there's this huge celebratory feast Saul would look so cool.

And so we all want to judge and say well clearly he wanted his his own victory he wanted his own name and lights and how dare he put God's name on this clear ulterior motive.

Now even as we're sitting here judging Saul for his horrendous behavior I would encourage us to also turn the magnifying glass back on ourselves because in truth we are not that different from Saul.

So I want to highlight two areas where we do tend to choose sacrifice over obedience.

The first area is what I call open hearted rebellion.

Now I know that sounds really big really harsh and it makes you think of turning away from God.

That's not exactly what I'm talking about.

What I'm talking about here is when you know you're just doing things for appearances when you are doing or following Christian ritual following God's principles you're doing it by action but your heart's not in it.

You're doing it begrudgingly.

You're doing it for appearances.

I would reference you back to the podcast entitled Before You Tithe talking about being a cheerful giver versus being a begrudging giver a person who is giving begrudgingly and out of compulsion and out of appearances would be engaged in what I would call open hearted rebellion.

You do believe in God.

You do believe in the wonderfulness of the divinity but for whatever reason you're feeling disconnected from the experience and so you're just going through the motions you know or showing up at worship service because but your heart's not in it.

You love God for certain you do but for whatever reason your heart's not in it and instead of going to God and talking about the feelings that you're experiencing or the disconnection you're experiencing you just continue to act it out.

You just continue to go through the motions.

You continue to walk through the sacrifice but are you being obedient?

Wouldn't it be that God would rather as I referenced in that last podcast wouldn't God rather have you understand the concept of tithing?

Wouldn't God rather have you have faith and strength in the relationship that you have with God?

Wouldn't he rather have that than your obligatory money?

Wouldn't God rather you be loyal to the relationship with God and talk to him about your crisis of faith and talk to him about this disconnected feeling that you have?

Wouldn't God rather have that than for you to have perfect church attendance?

Sacrifice is better than sacrifice.

So that's one way where we tend to forget about the obedience or where we think we're being obedient by doing this sacrifice and this is nothing that we're doing out of malintent.

Maintaining our allegiance to our worship services and our churches because we know we love God even if we're feeling disconnected and feeling a little dead inside,

A little dead.

Tithing and giving our money in the offering because we know it's the right thing to do and we know that we're honoring God but at the same time we're not very cheerful about it.

There's no malintent here.

We're not trying to be funny with God but what I'm wanting to point out to you and give you an opportunity to assess yourself.

God doesn't want your ritual.

God does not want your ritual.

God wants you.

When we talk about obeying God,

God wants you to be able to hear him.

God wants to be able to dialogue with you.

God wants to know that whatever he asks of you is because of the strength of the relationship.

It's because of the alignment and the value that you see in relating to God versus just doing something out of rote and routine.

God would rather have the obedience,

The authenticity of the obedience,

The authenticity of the loyalty.

He would rather have that than to have the ritual of sacrifice.

Now the second thing that we need to be aware of as we're looking at whether or not we're choosing the sacrifice over obedience,

We have to look at presumption.

Now this one,

In my personal opinion,

I consider this to be a bit more dangerous because presumption is when you assume what God would want you to do but you never consult him.

You assume that you know the nature of God and so you make preparation to engage in certain actions but you never have a conversation with God about it.

That's one version of presumption I should say.

One version is to engage in an action,

To move forward in what you think God wants even though you never talk to God about it.

The other version of presumption is when God has given you a directive but you decide to add to it.

See that's what Saul did.

Saul followed through.

He knew that God sent him to fight with the Amalekites.

He didn't pick a fight.

He did go to do what God told them to do but his mistake was in adding to it.

You know he did the job but he planned for this grand sacrifice that God didn't ask for.

God didn't ask him to spare the cattle or the ox.

God didn't ask him to collect the treasure.

If God wanted those things he would have said so correct?

But the order,

The directive was destroy everything.

Don't save anything.

That's pretty specific.

So for Saul to preserve the life of the king,

Preserve the life of the best cattle,

To not burn the best stuff even with the best of intentions,

Even if Saul had never set up a monument to himself,

Had never set up a parade to himself,

Even with the best intentions he was adding to what God wanted him to do.

He was making a presumption and God doesn't want us presuming.

God wants us to be obedient.

And as I said earlier we're not that different from Saul because how many of us have done the same thing?

How many of us have taken a God directive,

Something that we are absolutely sure that God wants us to do and we have added to it?

For example,

And this is something that I have been guilty of and so I'd like to believe that I'm not the only one.

For example,

God directs us to give a large offering with our church and we follow through.

We trust and we believe and we gather the money and we are obedient to at the very next service or whenever,

Whatever the directive to the timeframe that was indicated,

We have the check,

The money order,

The cash ready to go,

Ready to present to God.

Now for those of us who have attended church,

What is the typical protocol when you give money to the church?

You wait for the time of offering,

The collection plate comes in front of you,

You put the money in the plate and it keeps going.

And that's how you give.

That is the typical way to give.

So what would be different in giving whether it's $10 or $1,

000?

What would be the difference in the procedure?

There is no difference.

So if God asks you to go beyond your $10 and to give $1,

000,

You already know the method of giving.

So then why do we alert the pastor very specifically to say,

Hey,

I'm giving $1,

000?

Why do we stand up in the middle of the offering time and make a grand announcement and a grand statement to say,

I am giving $1,

000?

I know I'm stepping on a few toes,

But all I'm doing is really telling on myself.

Why stand up and make a grand announcement?

Why specifically alert our pastor or our heads of ministry to this gift when the only thing God said to do was to give it and there's already an established means of giving it,

Put it in the plate?

Why would we do that?

Now we can justify and say,

Well,

I just want to testify to the goodness of God.

I just want to emphasize that God is speaking to me and directing me and blessing me.

Uh,

By me giving this money and I'm receiving blessings on the other end.

I just wanted to make a statement.

But we can,

We could justify that.

We can justify that to ourselves.

But the question is,

Is that what God asked you to do?

Did God say,

Give the money,

Alert the pastor,

Make a speech or did he just say,

Give the money?

And the thing is,

And the reason why I'm just walking through this and the reason why I'm challenging this is because you know,

As human beings,

We want the attention.

Yes,

Yes,

We are giving that money because we believe in God and we trust God and we have faith in God.

Absolutely.

But it is very difficult.

And if we are honest with ourselves,

It is really difficult to do something that huge and not tell somebody about it.

We want people to notice us.

We want someone to pat us on the back.

We want our fellow believers to call us good Christians.

We want the acknowledgement and the handshake of the pastor for sure.

And and if it somehow graduates into us being invited to join the deacon and deaconess board,

Hey,

That's even better.

We want these things.

Even with our loving God and even with us being obedient to God in our presumption,

We add to what God has asked us to do.

And when we choose to add,

Even with our greatest and best intentions,

Even with our best excuses that we can give to ourselves and others,

If it's not God directed,

You're presuming and you're engaging in the sacrifice rather than the obedience.

And what does God value more?

He values the obedience.

He values you being able to hear his voice clearly.

He values you being able to align with him specifically and directly.

He values you trusting his word.

There may have been a wonderful reason for why you were not supposed to say anything to the pastor,

Why you were not supposed to stand up and make a grand speech.

Maybe there's a reason why you are not being invited to be on the deacon's board.

Who knows except God,

Because the only directive was to give the money.

It would have been better for you to give the money quietly and let these other things naturally flow to you.

Let the pastor naturally call you and say,

Hey,

I noticed that your offering is a bit larger than it was.

Let situations flow to you rather than you generating situations.

I know that was a huge side point,

But the larger point here is to avoid engaging in presumption because presumption is a form of sacrifice where God is looking for the actual obedience.

Now in addition to adding to what God has directed us to do,

Because at least you talk to God,

At least you got the instructions even if he added to it.

The other part of presumption is when you don't even talk to God at all.

When you just assume what God wants.

That's pretty dangerous.

That's pretty dangerous.

So you're not consulting with God at all.

You're just moving forward based on what you think you understand about what God would have asked you to do or what God would have sanctioned had you actually asked him.

Now this is where I'm going to get a little controversial,

So hang on to your hats.

Perfect example is what we're going through right now.

In this pandemic,

There's a lot of conversation about reestablishing worship services inside of our worship buildings,

Inside of our churches,

Inside of or whatever structure is out there.

But resuming those services,

Physically gathering together despite the presence of this pandemic.

And of course,

And of course the arguments that are being made is you want to demonstrate your faith.

You want to demonstrate your greater love for God than your fear of an illness.

You want to take the risk to gather.

Is this not a great way of demonstrating how much we love God?

Well,

My only question,

And it is only a question,

Did you talk to God?

Did God direct your path?

That's my only question.

Wouldn't God rather that you focus on the poor,

That you focus on relieving the oppressed,

That you pay attention to the people who might be suffering financially,

Physically,

Even mentally from the isolation that's being generated by this pandemic.

Not just those physical illnesses and symptoms that people are dealing with,

But the isolation,

The loss of connection.

Wouldn't God rather you focus on relieving those things,

Shining your light in those ways than returning to a building?

These are just questions.

I honestly do not have the answer for you because I can't possibly know what conversations each of us have had with God in being directed during this particular time.

But what I'm just merely bringing this up as we want to make sure that we're operating in obedience to God versus making sacrifices to God.

We want to make sure that we are aligning with what God has actually asked us to do rather than presuming what he would want us to do.

And it would seem,

And again,

This is only my perspective.

It would seem to me that God's greater desire for us would be to shine our light to those who need to see it,

To shine our light in those places of darkness,

To extend kindness,

Patience,

Loving kindness.

Anything that God extends to us,

We reflect it back out and we extend it to other people.

Would that not be the greater thing than to fight over whether or not we can reenter a building?

That's the question.

That's merely a question.

It's not a condemnation of anyone.

It is merely a question.

And so I would just simply encourage that if your greatest discontent is whether or not you can reconvene your services,

I would encourage you to take that opportunity to go and talk to God very specifically and say,

God,

I love you.

I want to return to my ability to be able to demonstrate my love for you by attending these worship services,

By singing your songs,

By giving,

By supporting,

What have you.

I want to demonstrate my allegiance to you.

I want to demonstrate that I love you.

Have that conversation with God and see what he tells you.

That's the best that we can do.

But to conclude this entire podcast,

Let us be more diligent about whether or not we are aligning with God in obedience or trying to get him to align with us through our sacrifice.

As with everything,

Our goal here is to strengthen our relationship with God,

To always seek out his guidance,

Because we're always going to need it being the imperfect,

Distractible beings that we are in order to be God led.

You have to let God lead.

Thank you so much for tuning in.

Again,

My name is Jamila Perry and this is the Help My Unbelief podcast.

Hopefully this information has been helpful to you.

I thank you so,

So much for tuning in and I'll see you next episode.

Reviews

There is so much wisdom here. It reminds me of one of my favorite quotes by Ezra Taft Benson, who said, “When obedience ceases to be an irritant and becomes our quest, in that moment God will endow us with power."

It's definitely a concept that takes long, steady effort to fully integrate into our lives. Thanks for the help today.

Very enlightening, I would prefer to obey and let God take the reins.

Very insightful, great point of distinction. Really enjoyed it.