Our church has adult Sunday school, which I appreciate very much. It gives us a chance to learn more about the Bible in a classroom setting, where we can ask questions of the teacher as we go along.
Thankfully, we have an excellent teacher, and we just finished the Old Testament book of Judges.
The book of Judges gives us some miraculous stories, including those of Gideon, the man who put out the fleece for a sign from God, and Sampson with his superhuman strength.
Overall, the time of the Judges was a very negative time for the Israelites. The last verse of the book of Judges tells us, “In those days… everyone did what was right in his own eyes.”
There is hardly anything more counterproductive to God’s plan for our lives than doing what we – who are born into sin – consider is right in our own eyes. We are desperately disobedient sinners without the atoning blood of Jesus. In our natural state, we think evil thoughts, do awful deeds and are willing to harm others when they get in our way.
In the time of Judges, the Israelites were forgetting their God and how He had led them out of slavery and into their promised land. God’s plan was to be the ruler of His people, but they, instead, wanted a physical presence. A leader they could see. They had a living God and yet they wanted an earthly king, so they would be like the countries around them. They wanted to fit in.
Doesn’t that sound a bit like all of us? Don’t we just want to ‘fit in’ with the rest of the world?
For humans, fitting in is our default when we don’t have a strong moral opinion that must be defended. Even sometimes when we claim to have a strong belief of a certain right or wrong, we will adjust to working with the wrong if it makes life easier for us at the moment.
Think of the times we’ve ‘gone along to get along.’ Maybe we haven’t really agreed to fit in with the world, but just maybe we are willing to sit on the sidelines where we at least hope nobody will notice that we’re not wearing the team uniform.
God’s people should neither fit in nor want to. Instead, we ought to stand out. The world is our home, but it is only temporary. Our home is with Jesus from the moment we accept Him as our Lord and Savior. We Christians should be the ones that others look to for counsel because we should look like Jesus.
God’s goal for our lives is that every day we grow in knowledge and become closer to being like Jesus. Jesus was sought out not only for healings, but to settle disputes, to seek His wisdom, and to learn the source of the peace that surrounded Him, which passed all human understanding. Others should see Jesus’ attributes in us.
As Christians, we need to stand wholly on God’s Word. We cannot affirm our own or others’ sins as ‘acceptable life decisions,’ or as ‘being true to ourselves,’ or we are doomed.
Being true to a sinful self is not at all what Jesus taught. Didn’t He say to the woman caught in adultery, “Go and sin no more.” Christians, doing as Jesus did, need to love others enough to call sin what it is, an offense against God. The more we join in with the world’s view of doing what is right in our own eyes, the faster we will see a great downfall to our churches and our nation.
Several of my relatives are very blatant in their disobedience to God’s Word and yet will fervently defend calling themselves Christians.
Christians, by definition, are followers of Christ. We are to imitate Jesus in His obedience to the Father. Jesus was sinless. We won’t be sinless in our lifetime, but that is our goal. We cannot expect God to honor our desire to follow Him when we are unashamedly sinning against Him. We cannot be going along with the world when it has gone wildly astray from God’s plan.
Jesus was very clear that we must be obedient when He said, “My mother and brothers are those who hear God’s word and put it into practice.” (Luke 8:21). Yes, those who do God’s will, and not our own, are the ones following Jesus. Those deserve the name of Christian.
One heartbreaking example of disobedience from the Bible comes from the famous King Solomon – the wisest of all kings. God gave him wisdom and wealth beyond any king and yet in his later years, he married foreign women that God had forbidden the Israelites to marry.
Those very wives led Solomon to worship false gods and disobey the living God. Because of that sin, the kingdom of Israel was torn in two. We read in Ecclesiastes that Solomon eventually learned the truth that wealth and wisdom are worthless if we don’t follow God’s plan.
Just as an earthly father makes rules for his child, God has given us rules to follow for our own safety, pleasure, and enjoyment. If we follow God’s plan for our lives, the joy is inexpressible. If we follow our own plan for our lives – doing what is right in our own eyes – we are endlessly striving to find that elusive thing that will finally make our life satisfying and worthwhile. It cannot be found.
Jesus is the answer to the world’s woes. All our joy is found in Him. Pray with me this week that the world’s masses would believe in Him and receive the joy and peace He readily gives.
ED. NOTE: Amy Patsch writes from Ocean City. Email her at writerGoodGod@gmail.com.
