Friday, March 7, 2008

obedience vs sacrifice

so, i could talk about the stuff going on today in my house...or the stuff going on in my heart. you get heart right now...

read this verse a few days ago -

"To obey is better than sacrifice." I Samuel 15:22

and it got my brain thinking. i've been pondering it for days. looked up some other verses on the same "idea" -

"You do not delight in sacrifice...the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart." Psalm 51:16-17

"To do what is right and just is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice." Proverbs 21:3

"sacrifice" as it is used in these verses is talking about the "ritual" type things we do - the "rules" we feel we have to follow. in the Old Testament they had to make sacrifices (killing animals) for all kinds of things. thankfully, we don't have to do this anymore - since Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice. but i think we still do things to try to atone things we've done.

bottom line - God wants our obedience. we need to be obedient. we will be blessed by our obedience. the thing is, it's way easier to check things off our "rules" than to be obedient.

1 comment:

Katy said...

Definitely so true. We studied some of this during my last study on the Tabernacle - what sacrifices were made, and how that equates to us today. It really is fascinating...that the obedience of the heart is what he's really after...and why that is SO much harder!