Deuteronomy 1:34 “And the Lord heard your words and was angered, and he swore, Not one of these men of this evil generation shall see the good land that I swore to give to your fathers, except Caleb the son of Jephunneh. He shall see it, and to him and to his children I will give the land on which he has trodden, because he has wholly followed the Lord!’ Even with me the Lord was angry on your account and said, ‘You also shall not go in there. Joshua the son of Nun, who stands before you, he shall enter. Encourage him, for he shall cause Israel to inherit it. And as for your little ones, who you said would become a prey, and your children, who today have no knowledge of good or evil, they shall go in there. And to them I will give it, and they shall possess it. But as for you, turn, and journey into the wilderness in the direction of the Red Sea.’
“Then you answered me, We have sinned against the Lord. We ourselves will go up and fight, just as the Lord our God commanded us.’ And every one of you fastened on his weapons of war and thought it easy to go up into the hill country. And the Lord said to me, Say to them, Do not go up or fight, for I am not in your midst, lest you be defeated before your enemies.’ So I spoke to you, and you would not listen; but you rebelled against the command of the Lord and presumptuously went up into the hill country. Then the Amorites who lived in that hill country came out against you and chased you as bees do and beat you down in Seir as far as Hormah. And you returned and wept before the Lord, but the Lord did not listen to your voice or give ear to you. So you remained at Kadesh many days, the days that you remained there.
Not doing what the Lord asks of us or doing what the Lord asks us not to do is the same thing. We either do not listen, can’t hear, or don’t care to be close enough to God to hear His voice speak into our lives through His word. The result is “doing what seems right” but it is not of God’s leading.
When we do something with the appearance of “good” we can come up with every excuse in the world as to why what we are doing is honoring God. Is the “good” you are doing a result of being led by God or because you think it seems the right thing to do or because society thinks you should? The question to ask your soul is; am I doing this to honor and glorify God alone, or am I doing this to make myself feel good, get some recognition for doing it, or earn God’s favor by doing it? God already has shown His favor, love, compassion, mercy, and grace through sending His son Jesus to redeem and call us to Himself. There is nothing more we can do but to surrender all of our being, heart, mind, and soul to humbly serve, worship, glorify, follow, obey, and honor to Him.
When we are complacent and neglectful our ears become dull or deaf to hearing God speak into our lives through His word or from others who speak His word into our lives. We seem to gravitate toward this as a natural default when things are going good and only return to seek and desire Him when things are troubling us. This does not honor God and He is not going to be mocked by this thinking. There must be a steadfast repentance and turning away from how we were and how we were thinking. This will never happen apart from gaining knowledge, understanding, and wisdom from His word. Peter said if you are not continuing to grow you are not standing still but rather you are drifting away. There is never a permanent position where we can say we have a full understanding and knowledge of God.
Does your heart ache for the way our culture is heading? Does your heart weep for the way our church body is leaning more and more toward the way of the culture/society? Do you see and hear the way of our society with the eyes and ears of man or God?
Be intentional in reading His word. Be intentional in listening to Him. Be intentional in honoring Him. Be intentional in obeying Him. Be intentional in growing in understanding, wisdom, and knowledge of Him.