A CALL TO DIE BOOK - Day 19

DAY 19: “GOD-AND”
DAY 19: “GOD-AND”
But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning,
your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure
devotion to Christ.
(II Cor 11:3)
When the serpent came to Eve in the Garden, he told her that she
could have it all. God had given her clear instructions not to eat from
a certain tree, but that, the serpent insisted, was a silly rule. She could
have a rich relationship with God and the ability to do whatever she
wanted. She was wrong, and it cost her.
- We are incredibly self-centered people. We focus on our wants
and our needs and our goals and our dreams and our time and our
everything else. When we become Christians, this self centeredness
dies hard. Very hard. Unfortunately, some Christian‘churches and
speakers reinforce this focus on self by promising that we can have
God and whatever we want. It sounds like this:
If you trust God, he’ll pave the way to your success. If you walk with
Jesus, he’ll give you the circumstances you always wanted.
If you only believe God, he’ll bless you with financial wealth.
If you trust Christ, you’ll have perfect rest.
Has God promised those things? Well, yes and no. He has promised
that if we are absolutely sold out to him, we will experience blessings
beyond our wildest dreams. But if we love him with all our hearts, the
greatest blessing will be knowing and loving him. We won’t care that
much about earthly blessings, will we?
The problem is not success, peace, wealth, and rest. Certainly, God
gives those to some of us. The problem is when those things climb up
to the center of our hearts and compete with us for our affections.
Those gifts are not wrong-unless they take God’s rightful place in our
lives. At that point, we begin using God to get what we want instead
of worshipping him. We demand that God gives us these things and
we are bitterly disappointed when he doesn’t. God isn’t interested in
being used to fulfill our selfish goals. He is interested in being our Lord
and us putting him first.
How can we tell if we want these things too much? Here are four
ways:
1. What do we pray about?
If our prayers are primarily centered on getting more of God’s
blessings, then we may be using God to get what we want. The
prayers Paul wrote out in his letters are full of praise and thanksgiving.
They are full of God, not man. When Paul prays, he asks for insight into
the depths of God’s love, for wisdom to know his will, and the strength
to carry it out.
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DAY 19: “GOD-AND”
Paul doesn’t first bring a grocery list of wants to God for his personal
gain. Requests are an important part of his prayers, but these requests
are in the context of praise and even the petitions focus on doing the
will of God, not pleasing ourselves.
2. How do we respond when someone has more than we do?
One of the best indicators of the condition of the human heart is
comparison. When we see someone get a new car, new clothes, a
new job, or an athletic scholarship, are we sincerely glad for them,
or do we smile and pat them on the back but think, “She doesn’t
deserve that. I do!”? When our hearts are full of Christ, we have
our treasure in abundance. We don’t long for more stuff. If we get
something new, that’s great. If not, it’s no big deal. Envy and jealousy
will eat us alive. They are rooted in the lust to have more, and
comparison is their fertile soil.
3. Do we get angry when God doesn’t give us what we want?
If we have a”God-and” demand, we are sure we deserve whatever
anyone else has-and a little bit more. When we don’t get what we
demand, we get mad. That anger may only simmer if we are good at
masking it, but if we are immature or volatile, we may explode in our
anger at God.
4. Do we feel sorry for ourselves when God doesn’t come through the
way we wanted? Instead of thankfulness, our mouths spit out selfpity.
“Why me? Why is it always me? Doesn’t God care about me
anymore?” Feelings of disappointment are normal when things don’t
go as we expected, but that can drive us to God to say, “Lord, what
do you want to teach me from this?” That plea is a long way from,
“Lord, I can’t believe you let this happen to me!”
A “God and” perspective, trying to use God to get our wants met,
quickly leads to a “God, but” reaction. When we are focused on our
wants and our needs, we find lots of things get in the way, including
obeying God. When he calls us to follow him, we reply, “Lord, but
you don’t understand. Serving you that way doesn’t fit in with my
hope of being successful and popular. I’ll wait for you to ask me to do
something else.” But “something else” never comes. When we insist on
God being on our terms, he refuses to play that game. We drift away
in our anger and self-pity, blaming God for what he didn’t do for us.
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DAY 19: “GOD-AND”
‘Do you remember the parable of the four soils, and do you remember
what choked the life out of the seedlings in the soil ‘that had thorns
and weeds? It was the deceitfulness of riches and the worries of the
world. That’s exactly what we are talking about here: when wealth,
popularity, comfort, rest, and entertainment, compete with the
growing seedling of God’s word in your life. What do you do with
weeds in the garden? You identify them (don’t yank out the flowers!)
and pull them out by the roots. That’s what you do with spiritual weeds
too. Believers who have walked with God for a while face an ther,
more subtle “God and” problem. They sometimes confuse devotion
to Christ with Christian disciplines of prayer, Bible study, serving, and
giving. Those are meant to open our eyes and draw us close to Christ
himself, not become a substitute for him. Prayer doesn’t save us. Bible
study is not our Lord. Serving and giving don’t fill the deepest holes
in our hearts. Christ does.These activities take on their direction and
meaning if, and only if, they are focused on knowing and loving Jesus.
At one point, the religious leaders argued with Jesus about who he
was and why he came. They were terrific students of the scriptures, but
they missed the real message there. Jesus told them, “You diligently
study the Scriptures because you think that by them you possess
eternal life. These are the Scriptures that testify about me, yet you
refuse to come to me to have life” (John 5:39-40).
The message is clear: When you pray, don’t just go through the
motions and hope God is happy with the effort. Look for Jesus. Listen.
When you study the Bible, look for Jesus in each thought and each
verse, and talk to him about what you find. When you worship, sing to
Jesus himself, not for those around you. When you serve others, serve
as if you were serving the Lord Jesus himself.
I think all of us have to wrestle with “God and” conflicts in our hearts
from time to time. They are harder to identify than outright sin because
our selfishness is mingled with Christian lingo and practices. We may
look just fine on the outside while we are practicing idolatry on the
inside. Simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ are developed when
the light of God’s Spirit shines on that conflict and says, “This is not the
way, my child.”
At that moment, we have a choice. The decision is not just one of
right and wrong; it is one of loyalty or disloyalty. When the prodigal
son came home and confessed his sin to his father, he was welcomed
warmly back into a rich, intimate, affectionate relationship. I can
imagine that his love for his father and the simplicity of his loyalty to
him grew exponentially that day.
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DAY 19: “GOD-AND”
When God shines his light on the hidden crevices of your soul and
shows you that a blessing or a discipline is competing with your
affection for Jesus, don’t be shocked. Say, “Yes, Lord. I agree. I want
to be completely loyal to you and you alone.” He will be honored by
that loyalty to him.
-Be still. Listen to what God is saying to you.
1. What are some ways we use God to get what we want instead of
loving and serving him?
2. Look at the evidences of “God and” in our lives. Do you see any of
these in your life? Explain:
-Self-focused prayers:
-Comparison:
-Anger when we don’t get what we expect God to give us:
-Self-pity:
3. What are some reasons we may let Bible study, prayer, serving, and
giving compete with our loyalty to Christ? Why do we get confused
about the role of these things?
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DAY 19: “GOD-AND”
4. Does it make a difference whether you see this idolatry as loyalty
and disloyalty to Christ himself instead of merely right and wrong?
5. Describe what it means for you to have a “simple and pure
devotion to Christ”:
6. Read Luke 15:11-32. Think about each paragraph, then use it as a
guide as you pray.
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DAY 19: “GOD-AND”
Memorize: Say Psalm 115:1, 17-18 aloud. How can you apply this
passage today?
Lord, today you are calling me to die to selfish desires by:
You are calling me to obey in these areas:
You are calling me to intimacy with you by:
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