Can you imagine how hard it was to go to the Temple at certain times to offer a sacrifice for sins committed, sins of omission? On top of that were the sacrifices of Passover, First fruits, and gratitude. Beyond the difficulty of securing the animal for the sacrifice, the person had to physically go and do.
How many things do you do every day or every week where you’re physically involved, but your brain is checked out? No, I mean it, how many times have you driven the distance from work to home and don’t remember having done it? You don’t recall passing that landmark, you missed seeing that business.
It seems the people had gotten lax in their focus. Their hearts weren’t being challenged or changed in their offering of the sacrifices, which was their purpose. God spoke through the prophet Hosea to let the people know that the going and doing wasn’t enough.
Those stinging words are also meant for us today. God wants more from His followers than church attendance and giving of tithes. He wants more from us than an annual mission trip. He wants more of us.
He wants love from us. He wants relationship with us. He wants us to know Him. Paul wrote of His desire to know Christ more in Philippians 3:10. Read the AMP version here.
We’re to love God beyond anything else then love those around us as we love ourselves. We’re supposed to know God beyond anything else, then share Him with those around us even as we know and are known.
This knowing Him requires spending time in His Word and in prayer—prayer that listens as much or more than it talks.
Let’s start today to choose Him over all. Let’s decide to do more than offer our meager sacrifices, then follow up that decision with intentional action.
Coffee, Bible, Journal.
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