Found in Him
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Obedience is Better than Sacrifice!
Carl Haak
Those words, "To obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams," are well-known words of Scripture. They are the words that Samuel spoke to Saul in I Samuel 15. Samuel declared this to Saul who supposed that the very opposite was true - that sacrifice and great deeds were better than obedience. God had given, you remember, to Saul a commandment: Destroy the Amalekites utterly. The reason was that the Amalekites, who were descendants of Esau, had attacked Israel when God was leading them out of Egypt and had attacked them from behind. Saul was commanded that he was to destroy them utterly. God gave a clear and an unmistakable command. "Go and smite Amalek and utterly destroy all that they have and spare them not, but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and *** ."
Saul disobeyed. He kept the best of the cattle and oxen for himself. He kept alive Agag, the king of the Amalekites. When he was confronted by Samuel, Saul excused what he had done in terms of his intention to sacrifice. He said to Samuel, "I disobeyed so that I might sacrifice. I disobeyed so that I might do something more important than obedience. I might render to God a great sacrifice of beasts." Now, of course, he lied. Saul did not keep the best of the cattle alive for sacrifice. That came to him as a good line when the prophet stood before him. He kept them out of greed. Even as Samuel is going to say to him, "You kept them in order that you could fly upon the spoil for yourself."
Right now that lie does not concern me. There is a deeper issue. That deeper issue is this: What delights the Lord? Sacrifice or obedience? Those are the alternatives, are they not? Obedience is to do what God tells us to do: to carry out His will, to obey His commands, to go the way that He makes plain. It is of grace. Obedience is of grace. It is the desire ( Rev. 14) to follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth. Or, in the words of Jesus, "to deny ourselves, to take up our cross, and follow Him." Obedience is expressed in those words of the apostle Paul upon his conversion: "What wilt Thou have me to do?"
Now belonging to obedience is that we obey fully and completely as the Lord commands. Saul thought that if he did almost everything right, that would be good enough, and that would be counted as obedience. But that was not obedience. It was not obedience to slay all of the Amalekites except one. It was not obedience to slay all of the animals except the good ones. Obedience is to do all that the Lord commands. This is not perfect obedience. We do not have that obedience perfectly. Yet God requires exact obedience. His commands are not negotiable. To obey means that we hearken to the voice of the Lord. We listen to the Word of God. In that Word, God tells us what His will is. We listen carefully and we do what He says. We do that out of love.
Hear the Word of God: Obedience honors God. Sincere, from the heart, obedience. Repentance glorifies God. This is His delight. The fruit of the cross of Jesus Christ is a life of principled obedience to God now in our hearts, and one day, in glory, perfectly. The sense of God's delight in obedience is precious. Therefore, for Him to say to us, "Well done, good and faithful servant," oh, what words for mere mortals to hear. Oh, for the grace, then, for each day to live a life of obedience to Him. Christ has saved us so that we might show forth our praise and thanks. And nothing so expresses praise to God as obedience.
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~To Him That is able to keep you from falling and to present you before His glorious presence without fault and with great joy...to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen.~ Jude 24
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