Living For God

DEVOTION

1 CORINTHIANS

LIVING FOR GOD

1 Cor 8:4-6

4 So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one. 5 For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"), 6 yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.

NIV

Is there any question about the fact there is but one God? Surely in Corinth there must have been the practice of worshipping the sun, moon, stars, rivers, trees, as well as other of their man made images of what they supposed some deity of their imagination looked like. Surely we do not place any value on anything in our world or give it a place of honor or worship it. We are surely aware of the scripture that we should not put any gods before our God. But the thing is He is not our God, He is God. We did not manufacture God, indeed He made us. He is the one and the only real God. We have no problem agreeing that all things made were though Him. We do not accept that foolish notion of the earth just happening all by itself, and that we eventually slithered from some pit of slime. We know God made the earth and the entire universe and we know He formed us as we are, in His image. We understand there is but one God for whom we live. Well there might be the rub. Do we truly live for Him? What does it mean to live for God? How does that look? It seems we sure do a lot for ourselves in this life. It seems we spend a far gather amount of time focused on our ambitions and desires than we do on living for Him, even though we are not sure what living for Him looks like. Could it be the difference between seeing how God benefits us or how we can benefit God? That may sound odd, us being a benefit to God. With God being the most all powerful being ever, how can we His creation be of any benefit to Him? In a world that may not know Him, at least as we do, we could be His ambassadors and introduce them to Him. That would benefit Him. In a world that may know of Him, we could bring glory and honor to Him for all we are, all we have and all we do. Do we tell people what we have done, or what we have, or what we just bought, or how we did this or did that, or do we give God all the credit? Do we tell others of what God has done in us, what He has given us, what He is empowering us to do? If we live for God and through Jesus Christ then perhaps we should look, talk and act as if we do. We should be living for God.