To Obey or To Make Excuses

1 Samuel 15:

22 But Samuel replied:

“Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices

 as much as in obeying the Lord?

To obey is better than sacrifice,

 and to heed is better than the fat of rams.

23 For rebellion is like the sin of divination,

    and arrogance like the evil of idolatry.

Because you have rejected the word of the Lord,

    he has rejected you as king.”

Well then... 

Doesn't look like things are going to well for Saul here does it.

The funny thing is that Saul actually had his excuses all lined out for why he didn't do what God commanded. (1 Samuel 15)

Saul even had it all planned out that he'd make sacrifices to the Lord in the midst of his obedience. He really had it all planned out. We may look at Saul and say "What a fool! You can't do God like that!" But do we?

Do we find ourselves saying things like 

"I know what I'm doing is wrong, but_______." or 

"I'll get some accountability, and continue in my sin but me having accountability is like sacrificing my secrets."

 "I live in sin, but I tithe soooooo....." 

To obey is better than sacrifices... Ya know I believe that this isn't just a better to God thing. I know it may be hard for us to obey God's commands and do what He calls us to do when it seems uncomfortable or hard to give up that old sin that we wanna hang on to, but God doesn't command us to anything that isn't good for us.

He commands us to things that will make us look more like Christ and glorify Him! Ultimately He leads us toward who we are meant to be in Christ!

Again just like in my last blog...

HE KNOWS THE PLANS HE HAS FOR US

NOT TO HARM US BUT TO GIVE US A HOPE AND A FUTURE

Obedience to God is good all around.

Lets do our best to not substitute sacrifices for obedience

Lets do our best to pay attention to God's commands, so that we do not find ourselves throwing together a bowl of ratchet excuses as to why we didn't obey, and when we find ourselves slipping, let's repent. Truly repent. Not just toss up a "my bad" and continue down that road, but turn around and go the right direction again. 

It's better for us to live in obedience than to live in a cycle of watered down repentance and excuses.