People go to great lengths at times to please others. Salesmen, for example will sometimes say and do almost anything to close a deal, earning them a reputation of being untrustworthy. We may find ourselves concerned about pleasing others around us because we want to be well thought of as well. There is an inherent self interest involved in most of these situations. Paul the apostle even commended on the marriage relationship stating the husband seeks to please the wife, and the wife seeks to please the husband (1 Cor 7.32-34). We spend a good deal of effort, money, time and other personal resources trying to please those that we want to influence, do business with, or sustain a personal relationship with. We also realize that in order to do this we need to know what a person likes, dislikes, wants, needs and desires. Equipped with that information we set out to accomplish that task. When it comes to God however we find that there are those who do not have this attitude. Instead of finding out what God wants, likes and dislikes, desires for us to do etc. we somehow believe that we have the right to determine these things on our own, basing them on what we want, think, need and find pleasing. The Bible does not agree with this line of reasoning and warns us of the dangers of this attitude.
Christ gave us the perfect example of service to God by doing those things that He had been sent to do, and did them in the way that God wanted them done. Christ stated, "...but as my Father hath taught me, I speak these things. And he that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him." (John 8.28-29). Many never realize that the things that they do for others are perhaps done to establish and reinforce their own sense of goodness. Christ, coming to this world literally emptied himself of all that he was in order to serve God and accomplish that which was necessary to save the world (Phil 2.7). There was nothing that Christ was to gain through the sacrifice that he made. His was only loss in the life and suffering that he went through to reach those few who will obey.
In thinking that we are pleasing to God we may hold on to those attitudes and ideas that will not completely alienate us from the present world that we live in. This is a misconception. The closer one draws to God, and the more pleasing we wish to be to him, the less comfortable and at home we will be here on Earth. Paul talks about the worldliness in our minds and that fact that we cannot be pleasing to God when certain ideas are present. "For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. (Rom 8.6-8). This would include all those who have not obeyed, and those who have obeyed but who have not changed their way of thinking to match that which we find in the scriptures.
In Paul's warning to the Galatians about being deceived by false doctrine Paul states, "But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed. For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ." (Gal 1.8-10). We hear many say that we should attend the church of our choice. The question to ask, however, is whether or not the church that we choose is the one that God would recognize as following the doctrine revealed in the New Testament. We find that there are many willing to change the doctrine in the New Testament because it would not be popular to teach it as it is written. Paul exhorted the Thessalonians to please God by following this doctrine when he states, "Furthermore then we beseech you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as ye have received of us how ye ought to walk and to please God, so ye would abound more and more." (1 Thess 4.1). It is not up to us to decide what is pleasing to God and what is not. We need to study the example that Christ gave us and then ask ourselves if the things that we are practicing are pleasing to the Lord. If the things that we do cannot be found or defended from God's word then we need to realize that they are not pleasing to God. If we are truly interested in being right in the sight of God then we need to find out what really pleases Him and not our own ideas, wants and desires. Service to God is exactly that - service. God does not, and will not serve us.
TLC