1 Samuel 2:30…for them that honour me I will honour, and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed
I like the old english spelling of the word honour because it is ‘our honour’. It’s ours to give or not to give. We honour God only because He deserves to be honoured. That is the only reason we can honestly honour Him. But honouring God has a side benefit. We get stuff in return!
When we honour God, we get honoured by Him. Honour is give and take. God is gentle and merciful, even when we don’t deserve it. That is reason alone to honour Him.
Good things in life are from God, honouring and blessing to us. The best things in life, and the greatest honour we can receive from God is His presence. We need to realize that God’s honouring us is directly related to us honouring, respecting, and valuing Him. Not because we deserve it, but because He wants to. He will always love us, but to honour us is different. We do not only honour Him with our fancy religious acts and words, but with our hearts, minds and actions. He doesn’t honour us with warm and fuzzy feelings, but in tangible, visible ways.
We can and should be an example of honouring God to a world full of dishonour and disrespect. More now than ever with this election nightmare going on. Hopefully we can honour God by being nice to each other when this mess is over. Elections, viruses, riots end, but God never will!
The desire of my heart is to take a step up in my reverence of God. I believe that I (and those who want to accompany me) will immediately see an increase in the manifestation of God’s power, direction and Spirit in our personal lives as well as in our ministries. We will see this as we are more diligent in honouring God in every facet of our lives.
As I walk closer to God by honouring Him, I believe our ministry and personal lives will improve amazingly. By faith in what God says, in 1 Samuel 2:30 *the opening verse. Those words are not mine, they’re from God. No one has arrived yet to the state of perfection in honouring God, but it is not an excuse to not try. It’s the effort of trying to honour God that honours Him, not the end result. We are to emulate Jesus, to grow up into His image, and to be like Him. The best way to copy Jesus is by honouring His Father, our Heavenly Father. We can all grow in this area, and it’s important to never get complacent.
Every problem I encounter in ministry and my personal life, I can trace back to an instance that I was not honouring God. Even dishonouring God in little insignificant ways, is dishonouring God. We should be aware of that. God is grace and love, but there are always consequences to our decisions, words and thoughts. Good consequences or bad.
God wants us to honor Him because He is our Father, if we are saved. God doesn’t want people that aren’t saved to honor Him. He wants them to become His children through faith before, so that they can truly honor Him.
God’s 5th of the ten commandments is ‘Honor Thy Father and Mother.’ Exodus 20:1–21
God is as much of our father as our flesh and blood father. My parents are deceased, but I love them and honor them in my heart. I also have my heavenly Father as well, whom I love and honour. Father God is just as real to me as my earthly father.
Honour is important in our relationship with God. If we don’t have honour for Him, we really don’t know who He is. We owe God honour, if we are His children. If we don’t know Him that intimately, we need to spend more time with Him alone in Prayer, and in His Word
Romans 13:7 Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom honour.
1 Samuel 2:12-35 talks about Eli and his sons. Eli was God’s priest to Israel. His sons inherited his ministry but they didn’t honour God. God warned Eli about them. Also, Eli saw that they were taking advantage of him, and their ministry positions. Problem was that Eli loved his sons more than he loved God. That led him to honouring his sons more than he honoured God. It resulted in all three if them dying in shame. If Eli had truthfully honoured God, he would have taken heed and instantly fired his sons after they prived to be unreliable. They had their chance and they blew it. If Eli had honoured God by firing them,they wouldn’t have been killed. If Eli had honoured God, his life would have been spared too.
God must receive all the honour in our lives if we love Him.
How do we honour God?
- Honour God in your homes. God gets honoured before your wife and kids. The best thing you can for your loved ones is to honour God over them.
- Honour God in your ministry (we all have one if we are saved ) Place honouring God above honouring the needs and desires of your flock. Sometimes, (most times) we have disruptions in the feeding centers. Anyone that’s been there for a while knows not to interrupt us when we are teaching our Bible verse, or praying. We honour God first, then those beautiful children. They know that, and secretly, they respect that.
- Honour God in your giving. (Giving is not just about money, get creative) Give joyfully to God, in as many ways as possible, without grumbling. You can keep from loosing your joy by not worrying about how expensive the new sound system is in the church or the new car the pastor just bought. You gave to God, to honour Him. What people do with that money is between them and God.
- Honour God in His Word, in Praise and Worship and in listening to good teachings.
- Honour God in your prayerlife. Spend time alone with Him. How you spend your time in itself is a good way to honour God.
- Honour God by thanking Him and giving Him the glory for everything because He deserves it.
- Honour God by honouring everyone else. Especially timely during the political strife we are going through.
1 Peter 2:17 Honouring all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king.
Dean and Winnie Peters
[email protected]
Joyfully serving the ‘least of these’ in Nicaragua for the glory of God
www.whatistheloveofGod.com
www.pureheartchildren.org
Facebook = Dean andWinnie Peters
Dean and Winnie Peters
[email protected]
Joyfully serving the ‘least of these’ in Nicaragua for the glory of God
www.whatistheloveofGod.com
www.pureheartchildren.org
Facebook = Dean andWinnie Peters