Jesus
said… If you love me, keep my commandments.
John 14:21
He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he
that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will
manifest myself to him.
Exo
20:3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
Not a
SINGLE other god before God!
Did you
know some people make their bellies God?
Php
3:18 (For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even
weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ:
Php
3:19 Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory
is in their shame, who mind earthly things.)
Many walk
…whose God is their belly.
We don't
have to use our imaginations too much here to comprehend what is being
said. Let's look at a few more verses
and we will know full well that man will make many things their gods in place
of the true God.
Isa
56:10 His watchmen are blind: they are all ignorant, they are all dumb
dogs, they cannot bark; sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber.
Isa
56:11 Yea, they are greedy dogs which can never have enough, and they are
shepherds that cannot understand: they all look to their own way, every one for
his gain, from his quarter.
Isa
56:12 Come ye, say they, I will fetch wine, and we will fill ourselves
with strong drink; and to morrow shall be as this day, and much more
abundant.
Luk
12:19 And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for
many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry.
Luk
12:20 But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be
required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast
provided?
Rom
16:17 Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and
offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them.
Rom
16:18 For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their
own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the
simple.
1Ti
6:3 If any man teach otherwise, and consent not to wholesome words, even
the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to
godliness;
1Ti
6:4 He is proud, knowing nothing, but doting about questions and strifes
of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings,
1Ti
6:5 Perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the
truth, supposing that gain is godliness: from such withdraw thyself.
1Ti
6:6 But godliness with contentment is great gain.
1Ti
6:7 For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can
carry nothing out.
1Ti
6:8 And having food and raiment let us be therewith content.
1Ti
6:9 But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into
many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and
perdition.
1Ti
6:10 For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some
coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through
with many sorrows.
2Ti
3:2 For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters,
proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy,
2Ti
3:3 Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers,
incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good,
2Ti
3:4 Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of
God;
2Ti
3:5 Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such
turn away.
2Pe
2:9 The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations, and to
reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished:
2Pe
2:10 But chiefly them that walk after the flesh in the lust of
uncleanness, and despise government. Presumptuous are they, selfwilled, they
are not afraid to speak evil of dignities.
2Pe
2:11 Whereas angels, which are greater in power and might, bring not
railing accusation against them before the Lord.
2Pe
2:12 But these, as natural brute beasts, made to be taken and destroyed,
speak evil of the things that they understand not; and shall utterly perish in
their own corruption;
2Pe
2:13 And shall receive the reward of unrighteousness, as they that count
it pleasure to riot in the day time. Spots they are and blemishes, sporting
themselves with their own deceivings while they feast with you;
2Pe
2:14 Having eyes full of adultery, and that cannot cease from sin;
beguiling unstable souls: an heart they have exercised with covetous practices;
cursed children:
2Pe
2:15 Which have forsaken the right way, and are gone astray, following
the way of Balaam the son of Bosor, who loved the wages of
unrighteousness;
2Pe
2:16 But was rebuked for his iniquity: the dumb ass speaking with man's
voice forbad the madness of the prophet.
2Pe
2:17 These are wells without water, clouds that are carried with a
tempest; to whom the mist of darkness is reserved for ever.
2Pe
2:18 For when they speak great swelling words of vanity, they allure
through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness, those that were clean
escaped from them who live in error.
2Pe
2:19 While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of
corruption: for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in
bondage.
2Pe
2:20 For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through
the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again entangled
therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the
beginning.
2Pe
2:21 For it had been better for them not to have known the way of
righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy
commandment delivered unto them.
2Pe
2:22 But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb, The dog
is turned to his own vomit again; and the sow that was washed to her wallowing
in the mire.
Jud
1:3 Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common
salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye
should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the
saints.
Jud
1:4 For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old
ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into
lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.
Jud
1:5 I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this,
how that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward
destroyed them that believed not.
Jud
1:6 And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own
habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the
judgment of the great day.
Jud
1:7 Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner,
giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set
forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
Jud
1:8 Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise
dominion, and speak evil of dignities.
Jud
1:9 Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed
about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but
said, The Lord rebuke thee.
Jud
1:10 But these speak evil of those things which they know not: but what
they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt
themselves.
Jud
1:11 Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran
greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying
of Core.
Jud
1:12 These are spots in your feasts of charity, when they feast with you,
feeding themselves without fear: clouds they are without water, carried about
of winds; trees whose fruit withereth, without fruit, twice dead, plucked up by
the roots;
Jud
1:13 Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering
stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever.
Jud
1:14 And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying,
Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints,
Jud
1:15 To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly
among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of
all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.
Jud
1:16 These are murmurers, complainers, walking after their own lusts; and
their mouth speaketh great swelling words, having men's persons in admiration
because of advantage.
We are to
have NO OTHER gods before GOD.
When we
are consumed with ungodliness we are choosing gods other than GOD.
Is God
FIRST in your thoughts?
Is God
FIRST in your mind in any circumstance?
Is God a
TRUE part of your life, a living, breathing, active part of your life?
Where is
God in your life?
God needs
to permeate every single aspect of our lives. There should be no part of our
life that God can't be in, not a single part!
God knows
how truly awful we are, God knows us at our worst, God knows and He wants to be
a part of our lives. We do NOT change to go to God, not ever! We go to God and
He will do all the changing if we are clinging to Him and recognize our
hopelessness without Him.
The
following is a rather LONG excerpt from the book - Pursuit of God by A.W.
Tozer. I don't agree with every single
thing in the book but it has a lot of spiritual truth.
'The
Sacrament of Living
Whether
therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.--I Cor. 10:31
One of the
greatest hindrances to internal peace which the Christian encounters is the
common habit of dividing our lives into two areas, the sacred and the secular.
As these areas are conceived to exist apart from each other and to be morally
and spiritually incompatible, and as we are compelled by the necessities of
living to be always crossing back and forth from the one to the other, our
inner lives tend to break up so that we live a divided instead of a unified
life.
Our
trouble springs from the fact that we who follow Christ inhabit at once two
worlds, the spiritual and the natural. As children of Adam we live our lives on
earth subject to the limitations of the flesh and the weaknesses and ills to
which human nature is heir. Merely to live among men requires of us years of
hard toil and much care and attention to the things of this world. In sharp
contrast to this is our life in the Spirit. There we enjoy another and higher
kind of life; we are children of God; we possess heavenly status and enjoy
intimate fellowship with Christ.
This tends
to divide our total life into two departments. We come unconsciously to
recognize two sets of actions. The first are performed with a feeling of
satisfaction and a firm assurance that they are pleasing to God. These are the
sacred acts and they are usually thought to be prayer, Bible reading, hymn
singing, church attendance and such other acts as spring directly from faith.
They may be known by the fact that they have no direct relation to this world,
and would have no meaning whatever except as faith shows us another world,
"an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens."
Over
against these sacred acts are the secular ones. They include all of the
ordinary activities of life which we share with the sons and daughters of Adam:
eating, sleeping, working, looking after the needs of the body and performing
our dull and prosaic duties here on earth. These we often do reluctantly and
with many misgivings, often apologizing to God for what we consider a waste of
time and strength. The upshot of this is that we are uneasy most of the time.
We go about our common tasks with a feeling of deep frustration, telling
ourselves pensively that there's a better day coming when we shall slough off
this earthly shell and be bothered no more with the affairs of this world.
This is
the old sacred-secular antithesis. Most Christians are caught in its trap. They
cannot get a satisfactory adjustment between the claims of the two worlds. They
try to walk the tight rope between two kingdoms and they find no peace in
either. Their strength is reduced, their outlook confused and their joy taken
from them. I believe this state of affairs to be wholly unnecessary. We have
gotten ourselves on the horns of a dilemma, true enough, but the dilemma is not
real. It is a creature of misunderstanding. The sacred-secular antithesis has
no foundation in the New Testament. Without doubt a more perfect understanding
of Christian truth will deliver us from it. The Lord Jesus Christ Himself is
our perfect example, and He knew no divided life. In the Presence of His Father
He lived on earth without strain from babyhood to His death on the cross. God
accepted the offering of His total life, and made no distinction between act
and act.
"I do
always the things that please him," was His brief summary of His own life
as it related to the Father. As He moved among men He was poised and restful.
What pressure and suffering He endured grew out of His position as the world's
sin bearer; they were never the result of moral uncertainty or spiritual
maladjustment. Paul's exhortation to "do all to the glory of God" is
more than pious idealism. It is an integral part of the sacred revelation and
is to be accepted as the very Word of Truth. It opens before us the possibility
of making every act of our lives contribute to the glory of God. Lest we should
be too timid to include everything, Paul mentions specifically eating and
drinking. This humble privilege we share with the beasts that perish. If these
lowly animal acts can be so performed as to honor God, then it becomes
difficult to conceive of one that cannot. That monkish hatred of the body which
figures so prominently in the works of certain early devotional writers is wholly
without support in the Word of God. Common modesty is found in the Sacred
Scriptures, it is true, but never prudery or a false sense of shame. The New
Testament accepts as a matter of course that in His incarnation our Lord took
upon Him a real human body, and no effort is made to steer around the downright
implications of such a fact. He lived in that body here among men and never
once performed a non-sacred act. His presence in human flesh sweeps away
forever the evil notion that there is about the human body something innately
offensive to the Deity. God created our bodies, and we do not offend Him by
placing the responsibility where it belongs. He is not ashamed of the work of
His own hands. Perversion, misuse and abuse of our human powers should give us
cause enough to be ashamed. Bodily acts done in sin and contrary to nature can
never honor God. Wherever the human will introduces moral evil we have no
longer our innocent and harmless powers as God made them; we have instead an
abused and twisted thing which can never bring glory to its Creator.
Let us,
however, assume that perversion and abuse are not present. Let us think of a
Christian believer in whose life the twin wonders of repentance and the new
birth have been wrought. He is now living according to the will of God as he
understands it from the written Word. Of such a one it may be said that every
act of his life is or can be as truly sacred as prayer or baptism or the Lord's
Supper. To say this is not to bring all acts down to one dead level; it is
rather to lift every act up into a living kingdom and turn the whole life into
a sacrament. If a sacrament is an external expression of an inward grace than
we need not hesitate to accept the above thesis. By one act of consecration of
our total selves to God we can make every subsequent act express that
consecration. We need no more be ashamed of our body--the fleshly servant that
carries us through life--than Jesus was of the humble beast upon which He rode
into Jerusalem. "The Lord hath need of him" may well apply to our
mortal bodies. If Christ dwells in us we may bear about the Lord of glory as
the little beast did of old and give occasion to the multitudes to cry,
"Hosanna in the highest."
That we
_see_ this truth is not enough. If we would escape from the toils of the
sacred-secular dilemma the truth must "run in our blood" and
condition the complexion of our thoughts. We must practice living to the glory
of God, actually and determinedly. By meditation upon this truth, by talking it
over with God often in our prayers, by recalling it to our minds frequently as
we move about among men, a _sense_ of its wondrous meaning will begin to take
hold of us. The old painful duality will go down before a restful unity of
life. The knowledge that we are all God's, that He has received all and
rejected nothing, will unify our inner lives and make everything sacred to us.
This is
not quite all. Long-held habits do not die easily. It will take intelligent
thought and a great deal of reverent prayer to escape completely from the
sacred-secular psychology. For instance it may be difficult for the average
Christian to get hold of the idea that his daily labors can be performed as
acts of worship acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. The old antithesis will crop
up in the back of his head sometimes to disturb his peace of mind. Nor will
that old serpent the devil take all this lying down. He will be there in the
cab or at the desk or in the field to remind the Christian that he is giving
the better part of his day to the things of this world and allotting to his
religious duties only a trifling portion of his time. And unless great care is
taken this will create confusion and bring discouragement and heaviness of
heart.
We can
meet this successfully only by the exercise of an aggressive faith. We must
offer all our acts to God and believe that He accepts them. Then hold firmly to
that position and keep insisting that every act of every hour of the day and
night be included in the transaction. Keep reminding God in our times of
private prayer that we mean every act for His glory; then supplement those
times by a thousand thought-prayers as we go about the job of living. Let us
practice the fine art of making every work a priestly ministration. Let us
believe that God is in all our simple deeds and learn to find Him there.'
