Looking for a Reason

 September 18, 2024

Have you ever looked for something with no real intent to use it once you found it? I suspect not. There’s no sense in looking for something you don’t really want and don’t intend to use.

Remember this as you read these words:

“Ezra had prepared his heart to seek the Law of the LORD, and to do it, and to teach statutes and ordinances in Israel.”  —Ezra 7:10

Living out the Word of God is better than just seeking to know it, Seeking without doing is hypocrisy. We’ve all been guilty of that, often inadvertently, but sometimes blatantly. The problem with hypocrisy is that others see it long before we do, and by the time we recognize it, it’s often done its damage. 

We are in a Catch-22 here. We believe in salvation by grace through faith, so where does the doing fit in, and how do we speak of it without drifting into “works righteousness?” The short answer is simple: Doing the Word of God is the evidence of our truly believing it. We aren’t in the business of academic learning, but life learning. And we don’t live the Christian life in order to be saved, but because we are already saved.

It’s like this: I serve my wife not to earn her love, but because I already have it. We “seek the Law of the Lord” and serve Jesus for the same reason.