Stop Sacrificing

This past week I have been reading through Hosea and ran across this verse. "For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings." (Hosea 6:6). This verse was in the context of God's rebuke for the nation of Israel concering their sins against Him. This isn't the only place that God makes this kind of statement. In Matthew,  Jesus rebukes the religious leaders of his day by quoting from Isaiah. He said, "You hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, when he said: 'This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men'." (Mat 15:7-9).

The principle is clear. God values heart relationship over religious regulations. In both  passages we see that God is primarily concerned with heart issues. Mercy, knowledge of God (referring to an intimate relationship), and the condition of their heart are what God is concerned about. Their sacrifices, their words and even their worship are all secondary issues in God's eyes. So, it made me wonder where we have failed in this area. While it is easy to sit in judgment on the Israelites who followed after false gods and the Pharisees of Jesus' day who were driven by man-made rules I wonder if modern Christianity is really any better?

Unfortunately it doesn't seem that modern Christianity has learned much from these warnings. We have often lifted up man-made teachings and ignored biblical commands. While no church, pastor, or congregation would ever admit this an objective look at our churches will tell a different story. We have churches today separating over the issue of the King James Version of the Bible. Never once does the Bible (including the KJV) ever claim to tell us which English translation is superior. So, without gettting into details about this argument, it is clearly a man-made dispute. We have churches today fighting over such "important" issues as whether a woman can wear pants, whether a particular musical instrument or style is sinful, and whether or not a church is truly godly if they don't have the holy trinity of services (Sunday AM, Sunday PM, Midweek service). Think about these things for a minute.

Woman wearing pants is never mentioned in the Bible once. The issue of cross-dressing is, but clearly this wasn't referring to a simple garment. Otherwise Jesus would have been in sin since he wore a robe and so did the women of his day. They happened to have women's robes and men's robes (sounds alot like pants today).

The issue of musical instruments and styles is hotly debated today and I have a simple solution. If it isn't mentioned in the Bible stop fighting about it. In the Psalms we see every conceivable instrument (including drums) used to worship God. We also see different styles of music - some softer, but most louder. So, once again, we have wasted countless hours, days, weeks, and years of God's time arguing over something that isn't clearly stated in Scripture and is more an issue of preference than anything else.

The third issue of church services is also never mentioned in the Bible. We do see that some churches in the New Testament met on the first day of the week, but we also see that many churches met every night of the week. So this is also something that each church must decide for themselves. What is my point? We have become modern-day Pharisees. We are arguing over someone picking up their bed on the Sabbath and missing the awesome healing power of the Messiah standing right in front of us. As Jesus stated, We are straining at a gnat. But what about the part about swallowing a camel? We are good at arguing over insignificant and non-biblical issues, but what bible commands have we ignored?

In the passage where Jesus mentions straining a gnat and swallowing a camel (Matt 23) Jesus mentions several "weightier" issues. Issues such as justice, mercy, and faithfulness. He mentions the sins of greed and self-indulgence. His conclusion is that by ignoring these things we are outwardly righteous, but truly full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. I would argue that while this is a rather harsh judgment it is an accurate one of the church in America today. One of the most glaring issues that we have ignored as American Christians is the issue of poverty. I discussed this issue this past Sunday morning with my congregation. We allow thousands of men, women, and children (especially children) to die every day because of starvation, malnutrition, and preventable diseases. This sounds like an issue of justice and mercy to me. Yet what are we doing about it? Many of you are familiar with the story of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. What many of you may not realize is that God tells us later about the sin that caused Him to destroy them. Although the sin of homosexuality is mentioned elsewhere, God clearly states that they "had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy" (Ez 16:48-49). Do you realize that God places the sin of homosexuality and the sin of neglecting the poor on the same footing? He literally destroyed two cities because of this sin. It makes you wonder what God thinks of the American Church today.

Not only do we have issues with mercy, justice, and faithfulness, but we also have problems with the sin of greed and self-indulgence that Jesus mentioned. All you have to do is go to the mall, look online, or watch TV for a few minutes to understand that our entire culture is based on greed and self-indulgence. Every advertisement, every commercial, every billboard screams to us that we are worth it. The moment we earn a raise or receive money unexpectedly we start spending it on ourselves. We are so quick to ask, "What can I get with this?" when we should be asking "Who can I help with this?"

Even in the area of politics we see our greed. Christianity has become almost synonymous with right-wing conservative values (rather than Jesus Christ, but that is another issue). While some of these values are biblical, such as being pro-life, many of the values of the "Right" are really based in greed and a concern with our pocketbooks. We want lower taxes, not because we can't wait to give to the church or the poor, but because we want that nicer car and bigger house. We want to keep immigrants out because they will mess up our nice, clean country instead of realizing that they are an amazing mission field and there is nothing biblical about America being primarily "white." We vote against any kind of welfare crying out that it isn't the government's job to take care of the poor, yet never lifting a finger or giving to the poor ourselves. When did this become acceptable? When did we allow the American Church to become so consumed with insignifance? We are more excited about fasting for a Republican than we are about praying for an unbeliever.

So what do we do about this? We go back to the Bible to discover what God views as really important. We look at the final command of Christ to go into the whole world (not just America) and make disciples by teaching and baptizing them. We stop bickering about issues of preference and just decide that it really isn't worth it. We find ways to help and give and serve in our community as we share the love of Christ with others. And we pray this prayer.

Oh, God, please forgive us for our sin. Forgive us for being consumed with trivialities while ignoring great sins of injustice and neglect. Forgive us for enjoying our sin of greed and ignoring the needs of others. Forgive us for worshipping at the idol of American consumerism while turning a blind eye to unbelievers in need of the Gospel. Lord, guide us and direct us as we desire to worship you through a relationship of love.