how can you please god

David's desires in relation to the ark of God were very different from those of king Saul, for he genuinely sought to do what would give God pleasure. But a right desire is not enough; we should at all times seek what the will of the Lord is regarding our intentions and activities. It is the word of God that is the discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart (Heb. 4:12); and it is the word of God that can alone show us what we should do to please God.

The true ground for a believer, and that which pleases God, is this, — not to do a thing simply because it is right, but because it is His will. The life that is formed on obedience is of an altogether different texture and source. To do things because they are right is to do without God and His word. It is merely idolizing self. The man becomes judge of all: "I think this, I do that, because it is right in my judgment." Obedience alone puts man down, and God in His place. This only is right. Hence therefore we find, as the first distinguishing trait of the divine life, the exercise of obedience: not only are His commandments to be kept, but also His word.

Our having the commandments is the sign of an obedient heart taught of God - the communicated apprehension of the divine mind as in the word, spiritual communion with God giving that discernment; our keeping them, of a patient will under Him to follow on as led and established by Him, and in spite of, and overcoming the enemy; God working in us both to will and to do of His good pleasure.

But there is to be a present effect as well as a future result of this wonderful work of God. "We are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." God designs us not for a life of mere ecstasy, like that of a monk shut up in a cell, but for a life of practical, real, good works. Believers are not to be idle spectators but actual workers. What are the good works? Is it whatever we take into our heads? Is it to do what we consider good, and nice, and amiable, to benefit our fellowmen, to elevate mankind, and such like ideas, by which so many are governed? No, we are not left to follow our own fancies. God has before prepared the good works in which it is His will that we should walk. Not only are we ourselves His workmanship, but the very sphere and character of the works which we are to do are already prepared by Him for us. How are we to get into these things and carry them out? Faith, which accepts what is of God, and absolute dependence, which characterises the new man, make all quite simple. If we forget, or neglect, or disregard the fact that we have been taken out of all that which belongs to man naturally, and brought into this new sphere, we shall very readily drift with the multitude, and find ourselves engaged in a hundred things which God never intended us to be engaged in, and practically leaving aside those things which He would have us occupied about — much less imposing, perhaps, but far more agreeable to Him. "To obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams." Nothing can please God so much as to do His will; nothing pleases us so much naturally as to do our own will. If we have really got rid of ourselves we shall have done with our will as well as with our responsibilities, for both alike go in the death of Christ. And if we through grace have accepted God's will instead of our own it will be just as real a pleasure to us — indeed, a far more real pleasure — to carry out what we find to be His will than it would be to do that which our own hearts might suggest.

When the Spirit portrays in detail the incomparable stoop of grace, He precedes it by the exhortation "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 2:5). Conformity to Christ commences in the heart and mind. So that the mind of the saint, like that of his Exemplar, should ever be open for directions from above. Obedience is implicit subjection to that which is heard. This principle marks even the initial stage of the believer's life. The hypakoe of faith, was the aim of Paul's preaching (Rom. 1:5; 16:26), for faith cometh by hearing, "akoe" (Rom. 10:17). And no saint, however advanced, gets beyond dependence on the word of God. The most obedient child is the one whose words and ways are most influenced by the scriptures. Not the dull, wearisome, legal-minded, external conformity to His word, because such and such is known to be His will, and, therefore, must be obeyed; but a running in the way of His commandments a saintly alacrity in divine things, a holy anxiety to know His will and to do it. Such a cheerful obedience to His revelation will be a savour of Christ in His people, well pleasing before Him. And is not this worth seeking? Thank God, He has made us "partakers of the divine nature" and given us of His Spirit, in order that the task may not be in vain.

We now, in like manner, are called to have faith in God, for God has revealed Himself to us also — in another way, it is true. But still God is a revealer of Himself to us sinners now, and we have now to render the obedience of faith. And "without faith it is impossible to please him." Just as with Adam: all his joy in the garden was as worship. If Adam delighted in the flavour of its fruit, the scent of its flowers, or the singing of the birds there, all might be counted as worship. But Adam should have believed also, and his faith would have been the highest act of worship. For the heart would have rendered its service to God by faith or confidence in His word, while the eye and the ear and other senses would have been exercising themselves in the garden of God as in the holy places of a temple,

Our walk will please the Lord, for a walk with Him will be according to His will and His thoughts. In this way God will find practically His good pleasure in His sons (Ephesians 1:5). Christ Himself is our perfect Model in this respect, for God was well-pleased in Him (Matthew 3:17). In the Septuagint (quoted in Hebrews 11:5) the words that Enoch walked with God, are rendered that he was pleasing to God. Enoch's life contrasted sharply with that of people in the line of Cain, who went out from the presence of the Lord and refused to walk with God (cf. Genesis 4:16-17). A very important feature of such a walk with God is that it is a life of faith, for "without faith it is impossible to please Him" (Hebrews 11:6). We have been justified by faith, and so we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 5:1). But then as Christians we should continue to live by faith, for the righteous one shall live by faith — not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7; Hebrews 10:38).

Before anything can be done, if we have not this certainty, before we enter upon any particular service, we should seek to get it, judging our own hearts as to what may be hindering. Suppose I set about doing a thing, and meet with difficulties, I shall begin to be uncertain as to whether it is God's mind or not, and hence there will be feebleness and discouragement. But, on the other hand, if acting in the intelligence of God's mind in communion, I shall be "more than conqueror," whatever may meet me by the way. (Rom. 8:37.) And note here, not only does the power of faith, in the path of faith, remove mountains; but the Lord deals morally, and will not let me find out His way, unless there be in me the spirit of obedience. What would it avail? unless indeed God should provide for His own dishonour! "If any man will do [wills to do] his will," says our Lord, "he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself." (John 7:17.) This is precisely the obedience of faith. The heart must be in the condition of obedience, as Christ's was, "Lo, I come," etc. The apostle speaks to the Colossians of being "filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding." (Col. 1:9.) Here it is quickness of understanding in the fear of the Lord, the condition of a man's own soul, though his spirit of mind will be necessarily shown in outward acts, when that will is set before him; as Paul goes on to say, "that ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God."

God has nothing less for us down here than walking in the steps of His own dear Son. The obedience of Jesus Christ is not a single act, but a life of constant obedience. He was obedient even unto death, and that the death of the cross. Israel failed grievously as regards the obedience of the law, and God is not seeking from us any legal obedience: but having given us His Spirit He desires us to walk in the power of the Spirit in the steps of Jesus. It is in obedience to God's will that we enter into His mind, and by obedience that we manifest our faith in Him. The truth is only really held in the measure of our obedience to the will of God.

1 John 2:3. Obedience to the commandments of God brings to our souls the consciousness that we know Him. These divine commandments are in the Scriptures, and make known what God desires from His children in this world; they are not the ten commandments given to the nation of Israel, they are not given to us that we might endeavour to obtain life by keeping them, but they are the means of keeping us in the blessed sense of God's love. Every true Christian has the knowledge of God, and the measure of his consciousness and enjoyment of this knowledge is the measure of his obedience to the will of God, expressed in His commandments and words. This is developed for us in John 14:15, 21, 23. But there are those who profess to know God, yet know nothing of obedience to His revealed commands; their profession is utterly false, and the truth is not in them. Had the truth been in them, it would have been manifested in the obedience that delights in God's will.