WHAT PLEASES GOD?
Without faith it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. Heb. 11:6, R.S.V.
A young girl works diligently to clean her room before her mother arrives to inspect the results. Mother surveys the handiwork and purrs her satisfaction. "This really pleases me," she says. Daughter later learns that Mother is pleased also by flowers on her birthday and by sweet willingness to obey.
How easy it is, then, for the daughter to draw conclusions about how to please God. She is sure that God requires good behavior, or even special favors, in order to be pleased with her. The word pleased implies that she has finally measured up to some standard of performance that He accepts as adequate.
But a mother's heart knows that this is not the case. Mother is delighted not with the clean room, but with the daughter herself. The birthday flowers are special, not just because of their color and aroma, but because of the warm mother-daughter relationship that they express. It is not her daughter's performance, but her loving presence in her life, that brings the mother such delight.
The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were enjoying the most perfect love relationship among themselves. There is only one way in which a perfect love relationship can be enhanced, and that is by increasing the number of people who enjoy it! And so the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit created the human race. They wanted to share the delights of fellowship with more persons who are able to enter into that joy.
This informed, loving, mutually enjoyed fellowship is the essence of the faith relationship. That is what Satan has destroyed in the Fall. And that is what God wants to restore. Nothing short of this will bring Him delight, for nothing short of this meets the purpose in our creation.
While it is not our performance but our fellowship that brings God delight, certainly nothing is more powerful to produce proper performance in His people than the vital reality of that very fellowship!
But Paul has yet another surprise for us in this text. He says that God will reward those who earnestly seek Him. But with what shall He reward them? If they seek a fish, will He reward them with a stone? If they seek God Himself, will He reward them with anything less than the very thing they seek--personal, life-giving fellowship with Himself?
Without faith it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. Heb. 11:6, R.S.V.
A young girl works diligently to clean her room before her mother arrives to inspect the results. Mother surveys the handiwork and purrs her satisfaction. "This really pleases me," she says. Daughter later learns that Mother is pleased also by flowers on her birthday and by sweet willingness to obey.
How easy it is, then, for the daughter to draw conclusions about how to please God. She is sure that God requires good behavior, or even special favors, in order to be pleased with her. The word pleased implies that she has finally measured up to some standard of performance that He accepts as adequate.
But a mother's heart knows that this is not the case. Mother is delighted not with the clean room, but with the daughter herself. The birthday flowers are special, not just because of their color and aroma, but because of the warm mother-daughter relationship that they express. It is not her daughter's performance, but her loving presence in her life, that brings the mother such delight.
The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were enjoying the most perfect love relationship among themselves. There is only one way in which a perfect love relationship can be enhanced, and that is by increasing the number of people who enjoy it! And so the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit created the human race. They wanted to share the delights of fellowship with more persons who are able to enter into that joy.
This informed, loving, mutually enjoyed fellowship is the essence of the faith relationship. That is what Satan has destroyed in the Fall. And that is what God wants to restore. Nothing short of this will bring Him delight, for nothing short of this meets the purpose in our creation.
While it is not our performance but our fellowship that brings God delight, certainly nothing is more powerful to produce proper performance in His people than the vital reality of that very fellowship!
But Paul has yet another surprise for us in this text. He says that God will reward those who earnestly seek Him. But with what shall He reward them? If they seek a fish, will He reward them with a stone? If they seek God Himself, will He reward them with anything less than the very thing they seek--personal, life-giving fellowship with Himself?
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