2 Corinthians 5:9-10
9 So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. 10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.
“But even prior to that task is the aim and focus of all our emotions and actions toward God. We must make it our ambition to bring glory to God, and that glory will only come when we seek to honor him as Lord in every aspect of our lives. What is true of all men and women is especially or doubly true for the Christian ministry. We must make it our aim to please him (cf. 2 Cor. 5:9), and that is what Malachi 2:2 also urges as the aim of all ministry. Thus the concern for the glory of God and the Word of God lead off in Malachi 2. Anything less than a full-hearted response to the honor, reputation, and status of the living God and the truth taught in his Word is a type of moral pollution. It is a substitution of something ephemeral, transitory, unsatisfying, and spiritually empty of nutritional value for something abiding, substantial, and nourishing to the total being of individuals. This text, then, calls for four new affections if we are to respond adequately to the Lord whose ringing declaration of his persistent love for us continues to resound from the opening of the Book of Malachi, ‘I have loved you,’ says the Lord.” (W. Kaiser)
Prayer: Lord we ask for new affections that reflect your sovereign love over us. May it be evidenced in our church, in our homes, and in our ministries. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Let’s worship to the song “Living with a fire” by Jesus Culture (click here).
-GK