Are you cheating on God?
What I am asking is: Are you giving him the loyalty, devotion, and service He deserves?
People in Malachi were cheating God (1:6-14; 3:8-10). The Laodiceans were cheating God by being lukewarm in their faith (Rev. 3:15-21). The rich young ruler was cheating God with his money (Mat. 19:19-22).
You can cheat God with your church attendance, contribution, commitments, service to others, and work for the church.
Now, we typically know when we are cheating God. A little voice in our conscience keeps bothering us saying we are cheating God, but we tell ourselves some lies that salve our conscience.
What are the lies we tell ourselves when we are cheating on God?
- We think feelings are what really matter. If I asked you who is most important in your life, you would say God. If I said, “Do you love Jesus?” You would reply with a strong “yes!” But is that what your life says. What would those closest to you say is your your top priority? We judge our loyalties by how we feel, but it is not often an accurate assessment. The rich young ruler had strong feelings for God, but his actions were sorely lacking. This is James emphasis in 2:14-26 when he teaches that “faith without works is dead.”
- We think He understands and His grace and mercy will cover us. We rationalize that God understands why we are not prioritizing him at this time in our life. He knows we have to dedicate so much to work and career. He knows we have small kids, and they zap our energy and require us to be at sporting events all the time. We believe we can’t serve or give like we should because of some reason, and God will understand this reason. The problem with this thinking is that it is really a lack of dependence upon God. It is a failure to realize that life would go so much better and smoother if he was the top priority and a part of everything we do. Yes, we must depend upon the grace and mercy of God to cover us, but let’s not abuse the grace of God by continuing in sin (Rom. 6:1-3).
- We think other things are more pressing and urgent. Maybe the biggest self-deception concerns the dedication to the urgent rather than the important. God is treated like a spare tire, we want him there when we need him, but aren’t willing to invest very much in a daily relationship with him. We allow the urgent to replace the important, so we don’t read our Bible, seldom pray, and skip church, but we have time for the cars to be washed, the house to be cleaned, and the ballgame to be watched. God gets cheated because he is the last on our list and is not nearly as demanding in our ears as our spouse, kids, boss, and tv set!
I need a regular reminder of this lesson. I don’t want to cheat God.
Be honest, if you are cheating God, you need to honestly realize you are putting ____________ in front of him and quite believing the lies.
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These thoughts came from a lesson in the series Choosing to Cheat and were inspired by the book of Andy Stanley; When Work and Family Collide
1 comment
Excellent thoughts!