Are You Serving God Acceptably?

Somewhere in the course of the sermon in church yesterday, I heard my pastor say something about serving God acceptably and it seemed to scream at me. He then referred us to a scripture which just excited me afresh though I had heard it several times before.

Heb 12: 28 which says “therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear”

There is clearly an acceptable way to serve God. We have to stop thinking that we can serve God in any way we feel like and God will have no choice but to accept it. God is not so desperate that He would accept any kind of service or worship. If we must serve Him, then we must find out how He wants to be served and serve Him in that way. It is only those we do not respect and/or have taken for granted that we throw anything at. So it is even in our relationship with God.

I have found that when we lose reverential fear of God, we give Him just any service. Familiarity with God is more often than not, the reason we lose reverential fear. As the saying goes, “familiarity breeds contempt”. The fact that we are required to be connected with God and get to know Him closely does not mean that we should not fear Him. We must not forget that He is God. Since God is a father and friend, we sometimes forget who we are dealing with and begin to deal like as if He was man.

God is God and reserves the right to determine what is acceptable to Him. It is our responsibility to ensure that do not allow our familiarity with Him breed contempt. Some of us talk to God so much that we become flippant; for some of us, we have heard God so often that even when He has not spoken, we lie easily and say God said things He never said. For some of us, when we know we ought to be in church fellowshipping, we get lazy, lay in bed and say we are praying at home meanwhile the same God that knows you can pray at home said to fellowship with others and pray together. Finally, we close by saying God understands after all He knows we are men but the point is, do all these things add up to make your worship acceptable to Him? Concerning the ark, God instructed the Israelites as they journeyed in  

Joshua 3: 4NLT - “…Stay about a half mile behind them, keeping a clear distance between you and the Ark. Make sure you don’t come any closer...”

I believe the distance was necessary to keep them from getting too familiar with the ark so they do not begin to see it just as a box because though it was a box, it carried the glory of God.

If you judge yourself, the bible says you shall not be judged. So, are you serving God acceptably?