Posted on 03/21/2020 5:23:05 AM PDT by Pilgrim's Progress
“To do justice and judgment is more acceptable to the LORD than sacrifice” (Proverbs 21:3).
Here is an axiom of life, it is better to do this than to do that. Now, sacrifices in the Old Testament were animals, and animals were very expensive. Back in those days, oxen and cattle were very highly prized and to have enough of them to bring them to the altar of sacrifice meant that the man was wealthy. The poor were allowed to substitute pigeons and birds, because they did not have the price of a sheep or a goat or an ox.
You take a man that had plenty of animals, or a house full of sacrifices, who could take any animal at any time to the temple. God was not interested in that. Some people that had a lot of animals figured that they could just live as wickedly as they wished, because they could cover the deed with their animals. God is not interested in a man’s sacrifice; He is interested in him doing right. He would rather have you do right and bring a pigeon, than to flaunt sin and bring hundreds of oxen.
A lot of people think they can get away with things because they put a lot of money in the coffers of churches and religious organizations. It is nothing but conscience money, and God detests it. A lot of people figure they can stay home from churches and just send a few checks into some television evangelist, and that will satisfy the Lord. That kind of sacrifice to them justifies their ways, for “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes: but the LORD pondereth the hearts” (21:2). God isn’t interested in that. God is interested in them doing justice and judgment—doing right.
King Saul tried to get out of doing right: “And Samuel said, Hath the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams” (1 Samuel 15:22). Samuel told him that he had done wrong and God was not pleased because God would rather have his obedience than worship. Saul did wrong in order to have sacrifices, so Samuel said: “For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected thee from being king” (1 Samuel 15:23).
David, from his own bitter experience, tells us what the sacrifices of the Lord are: “O Lord, open thou my lips; and my mouth shall shew forth thy praise. For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise” (Psalms 51:15-17).
It doesn’t matter what you have to sacrifice, if your heart is yielded to God, God accepts it. The same holds true about our salvation, “Nothing in my hand I bring, simply to thy cross I cling; naked, come to thee for dress; helpless, look to thee for grace.”
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