What is more pleasing to the Lord: your burnt offerings and sacrifices or your obedience to his voice? Listen! Obedience is better than sacrifice, and submission is better than offering the fat of rams. Rebellion is as sinful as witchcraft, and stubbornness as bad as worshiping idols. (1 Samuel 15:22-23)In the denomination I spent most of my life and ministry, we had communion every Sunday. We also, though I began to think it totally useless, had communion on Sunday nights for those who had missed the morning service for one reason or another.
The rationale was that God felt weekly communion was mandatory and if you missed it, you were in danger. Therefore, if you couldn’t be there Sunday morning, you could always fulfill your obligation Sunday night.
At the end of the service, someone would always get up behind the Lord’s table and say that communion was prepared for those who were not able to be there that morning. Sometimes the words providentially hindered were used, as if an angel with a flaming sword had prevented them from coming that morning.
One evening, before church began, a woman came up and said she couldn’t stay for church and needed to take the Lord’s Supper. We commented that it wouldn’t be offered until after services. She became angry and said she couldn’t stay and she wanted it now.
So one guy stood and gave her the communion. She bowed her head reverently at the prayers and took the elements. Then she left feeling justified.
She had fulfilled her duty so she was fine until next week. The fact that her attitude was wrong was totally beside the point. She had sinned by her attitude.
Which would be better in your life? You have a birthday, so the kids bring in a package still in the plastic sack from WalMart and also containing the sales receipt. They slap it down in front of you and say, There’s your present. No love, no fun in giving, no consideration, just the fulfilling of a duty.
Would you keep the present? I wouldn’t.
I would much rather have the love than the present. And God is the same.
Today is Sunday. Just because we come to church doesn’t mean anything. Just because we sit in the chairs and sing and try to stay awake during the sermon doesn’t mean anything. If our hearts are not right, we are wrong, no matter how ornate or perfect our sacrifice, or the amount of our offering.
Samuel, the prophet/high priest of Israel told the disobedient King Saul this very thing. God does not want a sacrifice if the sacrifice is offered in the wrong attitude or frame of mind.
Just like you or me, God wants our love, not our stuff. And we do what we do because we love him, not in order to be saved.
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