What does God want?

I know it may sound wrong in our “politically correct” christian circles to ask such a question. We might even hear someone comment “don’t say that you might get struck by lighting” like we are going to step on God’s toes or something for questioning Him. But in these last couple of years I have found myself asking it more and more even out of anger sometimes. I just could not shrug the feelings of guilt and obligation that I felt in my soul. I know the Sunday school answer God wants our “everything”. I am always like what does that mean everything? What does that look like because the people that are usually telling you that are the ones whom themselves are just living the typical christianized american lifestyle.  But before I run off on a rabbit trail I don’t think I have it all figured out yet but I would like to share some of what I have been learning. This morning I was reading Psalms 1-5. One part struck a nerve with me that I wanted to share. Psalms 2:10-12  ¹⁰Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth. ¹¹Serve the Lord with fear,  and rejoice with trembling. ¹² Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him. Now I am sure you are a little puzzled but bare with me for one minute. I am going to substitute a couple of words for other words that could also be used.

O ____ insert name, be wise: be warned, O people of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Pay homage to the Jesus, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

The reason for substituting the words kings and rulers for more general words like your own and people was to show that this passage could be personalized it is not just some Psalm written long ago for a single purpose but it can hold meaning for us as well. As you can see I substituted Kiss for pay homage to. If you look up that word in the greek that word can also mean “do homage” so out of curiosity  I looked up homage and it means – a feudal ceremony by which a man acknowledges himself the vassal of a lord. I also substituted Son with Jesus because any time you see the word Son capitalized it is referring to Jesus. So when the psalmist said “Kiss the Son” what he was saying was pay homage to your lord acknowledge yourself to be his subordinate.

So to go back to my original question, what does God want? I believe what he wants from us is total surrender and to stop serving everything els in this world and to serve him with everything in us. For us to give up everything in our lives that distracts us from Him. Most Christians here in the States say that they don’t pray and read their Bibles more or at all because they are to busy. Busy doing what? Working to make money or spending that money on more or better things. So what we are really saying is that serving money and things is more important to us than spending time in the presence of the one we call our Lord and Savior. What He desires is more than our words saying thanks or singing praises with hands raised. He desires total and utter submission and obedience to His will. That is the hardest thing for us to give because we want control, we want to decide what to spend our money on and time doing. We don’t want to really believe that God is going to hold us accountable for how we have spent the time and resources that God has given us. We like to think that so long as we thank Him for all that He has given us that it is up to us how we use it. We don’t have to worry about the billions of peope that have little to nothing. I am not trying to tell you what you should or should not do but I am saying seek after your Lord pay homage to Him, surrender yourself to His will, put yourself at His mercy before you are out of time and find yourself on the day of Judgement and find that you have wasted your life seeking after the comforts this world has to offer and missed it and have to suffer His wrath.