The Heart that Pleases God

“To do righteousness and justice is more acceptable to the LORD than sacrifice” (Proverbs 21:3).

Friends, do you remember what Samuel said to King Saul, that “obedience is better than sacrifice” (1 Samuel 15:22)? Indeed, Samuel said to King Saul, “Does the LORD delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the voice of the LORD?” (v.22). When I meditate again on this passage, I think that we, like King Saul, may be loving and serving God from our own perspective. That is, we assume that God delights in worship, so we prepare carefully for worship on Sunday, but then live the other six days in this world disobeying God’s Word. We should reflect on whether this is the case.

The reason is that from God’s standpoint, He is more pleased when we live a life obedient to His Word than when we offer countless acts of worship to Him.

Looking at today’s passage, Proverbs 21:3, the writer Solomon says that God is more pleased with doing righteousness and justice than with offering sacrifices. In other words, God is pleased when we worship Him, but even more pleased when we do righteousness and justice in this world.

If we think carefully, Solomon went to Gibeon and offered a thousand burnt offerings on that great altar (1 Kings 3:4), but in his old age, his thousand wives turned his heart to follow other gods (11:3-4), thereby disobeying God’s command. When I meditate on this fact, I think: “When we offer God 1,000 acts of worship, Satan uses his 1,000 servants to deceive us. From our perspective, offering 1,000 acts of worship might seem pleasing to God, but from God’s perspective, He is more pleased when we obey His first command.”

Friends, what God centrally requires in people’s sacrificial acts is not the offering itself, but their ethical religious obedience. That ethical obedience is to obey God’s commands by doing righteousness and justice.

However, in the days of the prophet Isaiah, the people of Israel offered countless sacrifices while not practicing righteousness and justice (Isaiah 1:11). Regarding such sacrifices, God said: “What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices?” (v.11), “…I do not delight in them” (v.11), “…You only burden me with your sins” (v.12), “Bring no more futile offerings” (v.13), “They are an abomination to me” (v.13), “I cannot endure them” (v.13), “My soul hates them; they are a heavy burden, I am weary of bearing them” (v.14).

The prophet Jeremiah said that offering sacrifices while neglecting obedience to God’s word is nothing but an attempt to reassure sinful living (Jeremiah 7:8-10) (Park Yoon Sun). Look at Jeremiah 7:8-10:
“Behold, you trust in lying words that you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, burn incense to Baal, and follow other gods you do not know. Then you come into this house, and stand before me and say, ‘We are saved!’ to do all these abominations.”

In short, the people of Israel lied, stole, murdered, committed adultery, swore falsely, and sinned by idolatry, yet came into God’s temple and said before God, “We are saved; we are safe.” If we apply this to ourselves, sometimes we say that we believe in Jesus and once saved, always saved; but we go out into the world to sin and then come every Sunday to the Lord’s house saying, “Once saved, always saved,” thinking we are safe despite sinning. This kind of worship we offer to comfort and reassure ourselves is not pleasing to God at all.

Friends, what pleases God is true worship and a righteous life. When our life of worship is accompanied by obedience to God’s word, God is pleased. That word of God is to do righteousness and justice (Proverbs 21:3).

Why should we do righteousness and justice? Because the Lord practices righteousness and justice (Psalm 99:4). And “Blessed are those who maintain justice, who constantly do righteousness” (Psalm 106:3). Therefore, we should please God by doing righteousness and justice.

The heart that pleases God is the heart that does righteousness and justice.