More On Pleasing God

-

I wrote a post a few months ago about pleasing God, and many of you left sweet comments about how that had helped you. I especially love to hear when something I've written has encouraged you, and I heard from several of you in public comments and by email who were helped by that post. Thank you for letting me know that!

One of the comments here was from my friend Deby, and I wanted to address it publicly because her question opened up a new line of thought for me. Here's what she asked:
Is it carnal to want to please others...I just don't know....sometimes our hearts are pure on this, othertimes it is probably my flesh crying out for the approval
I really think she answered her own question here: sometimes our hearts are pure; sometimes we just want the approval of others. And I really think that's the key! What is your motive for pleasing others? Are you seeking to serve them (thereby serving God), or are you seeking to make yourself feel good or be noticed (serving yourself)?

For example, it's good and right for us wives to please our husbands. I believe with my whole heart that serving our husbands is serving God. If you keep your house clean to please your husband, that is pleasing to God. However, if you keep your house clean for the approval of your friends or to hear their compliments on how well you keep house or how organized you are - which gives you a feeling of self-worth - then I don't think that's so pleasing to God. I think he would call that vanity or being puffed up. When your house is a trash heap when your husband comes home from work, but it's spotless for friends to come over, I'd say you're doing it for fleshly, people-pleasing reasons! Ask me how I know this! LOL

For me, it all boils down to one thing: am I doing {insert good deed here} to make people think I'm doing good, to hear their compliments, to receive praise? If so, then I believe we're serving ourselves and not God. Kind of makes me reevaluate my motives!

Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.
I Corinthians 10:31

Comments

  1. Barbara H.6:53 AM

    I think you're exactly right, Susan. Pleasing others can be a means of showing love to them and ministering to them. But it can also be a means of self-gratification and attention-seeking. I constantly need to ask the Lord to keep my motives pure.

    ReplyDelete
  2. ~~Deby6:07 PM

    I think your verse summed it up....thank you Susan for your wisdom and how you use our precious WORD of GOD....to back up what you share...
    Deby
    can't wait till January...plan to attend to WHOLE thing !!!!

    ReplyDelete
  3. nanasknoll9:20 PM

    I agree whole heartedly with this post. It certainly is our motives. When I am cleaning as a wonderful job given to me by the Lord, I am most happy and peaceful, am doing for the Lord and my husband
    nanasknoll.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Thanks for taking a minute to read my ramblings and leave a comment! I appreciate it!

Popular posts from this blog

A Week of Modest Dress

-
Image
The rest of this series can be found at these links: Friday , Saturday , Sunday , Monday , Tuesday , Wednesday . Some ladies around the Blogosphere have been posting pictures of themselves going about their everyday routine in dresses. Many of us ladies wear dresses and skirts all the time, and others have asked how we play with our children, do our housework, exercise, in dresses. Candy decided to show some ladies doing just that on her blog, and asked for ladies to post pics on their blogs too. This kind of thing appeals to me, so I had to get in on the action on this one. I'll post pics each day for a week (if I can keep my son Andrew taking pictures!), and you'll see a little bit of our life as a pastor's family, as well as see how another lady and her daughter (though not so many pics of her - she's camera shy!) live out their conviction of modest dress in their everyday lives. Here I am this morning, as Samuel and I left the house for our walk. I alterna...
Read more

Who - or What - Is Your God?

-
I've read lots of opinions on lots of things during my years online. Wes was a programmer in the US Air Force from 1990 till 1996, and naturally, as e-mail and the internet came into more common use, our family was on the front edge of technology. I remember searching the web for Christian women's sites, and finding very little. After a while, more and more Christian sites began showing up, and I began reading and joining forums. It came to the point that I was reading about lifestyles varying somewhat from my rather mainstream independent Baptist upbringing. Some of it made sense to me, other things were a little far out there for me. None of it was wrong, though, and everyone had Scripture to back up what they believed. The latest thing to hit the internet is the blog. Everybody has one, at least everyone who knows what a blog is! And that includes me, of course. I love blogging. Anyway . . . we all read each other's blogs and it's almost like a parallel soc...
Read more

How Do You Respond?

-
This might get a little preachy, but it's something that hit me square in the face yesterday and I thought it would be a good thing to share. To set the stage: Yesterday morning, Wes and I were getting ready to take the kids shopping down in Bellingham, WA. The Lord has blessed us with an extra bit this month, and the kids and Wes needed some things, so after Andrew and Beth were finished with school, we were planning to head out. I needed to know what Wes wanted to do about lunch and supper, since we'd be leaving right around lunch time and we weren't sure when we'd get back home. I asked him if he wanted me to fix our main meal of the day before we left (which we've been doing recently), and he said no; we'd take some snacks with us. So I was planning what I'd do before we left so supper would be quicker when we got home. He casually said, "I thought we might stop at Red Robin (a restaurant) on the way home," to which I immediately respond...
Read more