When God’s People Don’t Honor Him
Dr. John Snyder is the pastor of Christ Church New Albany, director of Media Gratiae, host of The Whole Counsel podcast, and author of multiple multimedia Bible studies including the Behold Your God series, Living with the True God: Lessons from Judges, and Behold Your God: Seeking Him Early.
In Living with the True God: Lessons from Judges, Dr. Snyder explains that when God’s people don’t uphold His honor, God will do so at their expense.
When God's people are careless with His honor and fail to uphold His reputation, God will uphold it at their expense.
To some degree God entrusts His honor and reputation into the hands of His people. They carry His name wherever they go. Those who do not know God will inevitably form views of Him in part by watching the choices of His people. This is to be expected since every worshiper eventually reflects the God (or gods) he or she worships. When God's people are careless with His honor and fail to uphold His reputation, God will uphold it at their expense. Israel's repeated return to idolatry gave the nations a warped picture of God. Israel failed to uphold God’s honor, but He upheld it by disciplining them and bringing them back to obedience. This is still true of God and His Church today.
The unbeliever thinks that the Church is in a decayed state because God isn’t real. In truth, because our God is real a Christian cannot drift and remain undisciplined.
In times of discipline, our sad condition may cause unbelievers to misread what they see God doing. The Church's shame becomes God's shame in the eyes of the world. The unbeliever thinks that the Church is in a decayed state because God isn’t real. In truth, because our God is real a Christian cannot drift and remain undisciplined.
This was the case in Samson's day when God disciplined Israel. The Philistines ignorantly viewed the judgment of God on His people as proof that their god Dagon was victorious. The Philistines did not say: “The God of Israel is a clean God. He hates all sin and will not leave it unchecked, even in the life of His appointed leaders. That explains why Samson is wasting away in our prison.” Instead, they praised Dagon as the superior deity. They thought Dagon proved himself wiser, more powerful, and more faithful to his followers than the God of Israel.
What if the only way people could know God was by what they see in His followers? What would they see in you?