Sermons
Inside Sojourn
Exodus 29—Pleasing God: Bloody Sacrifices or a Broken Heart? by Robert Cheong
Do you struggle with believing you have to do something to be right with God? Many people wrongly think God will love them more or less because of what they do or don’t do. Many people wrongly think they can be right with God by doing or not doing certain things.
Can you imagine what it was like to live in the days of the OT, knowing that you didn’t measure up to a holy God? God required the death of animals and birds, which were slaughtered continuously day after day, as sacrifices, to cover the sins of His people.
We often live with this Old Testament mindset, thinking if I offer the “right sacrifice,” everything will be cool between me and God–for instance doing good, serving others, reading our Bibles, praying, or changing our behaviors. There is bad news and good news. The bad news is that nothing we can ever do as sinners will please a perfect God! The good news is God chose his Son as the perfect sacrifice, to die once for all to forgive us of our sins–making us no longer guilty and forever right before a holy God!
Whether we are faced with the outward sins of adultery and murder, or the inward sins of lust and hatred, we need to believe the only thing that will satisfy a holy God is the perfect and completed sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Cry out to God for mercy so that we might believe God is more pleased with our broken and repentant hearts than with our “bloody sacrifices.”
For You do not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it; You are not pleased with burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise. (Ps. 51:16-17).
About Bobby Gilles
thanks for this reminder, robert!! we are so prone to self-justification and have to fight to remember our sacrifice was made and we live in His grace.
Lauren, you and me both sister! God is so good he gives us the grace to believe in this incredible gospel truth!
Thanks Robert, for this timely message! I am sitting here taking a break from writing a paper on repentance vs. penance and your words here serve to solidify in my mind what I’m currently studying. I too, often fall for that lie that I have to be good enough to be accepted by God. Since repentance requires a turning from sin on my part, it is easy to fall into the thinking that my justification is based on what I am doing rather than what Christ has already done for me.
Getting to the point where I am are heart-broken over my sin takes a lot of work. So often, even as I am repenting, I find myself mitigating my sin. I shrink it in my mind by thinking ‘well, at least I’m not as bad as ____’ or ‘it was only _____’. I long to come to a place where I realize all sin as heinous because all sin is turning my back on the holy God who sent His Son so I could have fellowship with Him! I long to come to a place where I am no longer comparing myself to other people and realize that I am the worst sinner I know, because I can see my heart and how fickle and feeble I am.