The Lord says: ‘These people come near to me with their mouth and honour me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is based on merely human rules they have been taught.
Isaiah 29:13 NIVUK
Perhaps it's a real shock to see the sincerity as one of the principles of a good quiet time. Maybe you think it's a bit like telling someone that they need to breathe or eat well or get regular exercise.
Yet sincerity - or, we could also say, integrity - is a quality that is completely critical but easy to miss out.
Sincerity isn't happening when people say this searing truth about us:
So you must be careful to do everything they tell you. But do not do what they do, for they do not practise what they preach.
Matthew 23:3 NIVUK
I've seen all sorts of aberrations that masquerade as Christian but are nothing of the sort: priests blessing cars with 'holy' water so they can be driven by a lunatic but never crash; transportation drivers with a picture of the Virgin Mary next to a soft pornographic picture of a woman; worshippers gathered outside a church for an Easter vigil with skimpy nightclubbing gear on beneath their heavy coats; preachers who say they preach the Gospel but freely threaten people with physical harm if they disagree; pastors who preach that God is love but tolerate harmful behaviour that God hates; church leaders claiming to be 'oh, so spiritual' who offer to help you in your suffering, provided you make them rich or serve their agenda.
Every one of those examples is woefully insincere.
Let's take a trip back in time to the original quiet time - the Garden of Eden. In the middle of the Garden - as with many places where we can meet with God - Adam and Eve had a choice between receiving God's most amazing of blessings - eternal life - or feeding their own pride and ego. They chose wrongly. They chose the latter. These are the gentle yet troubling words God spoke to them:
Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. But the Lord God called to the man, ‘Where are you?’
Genesis 3:8-9 NIVUK
God didn't ask Adam this question because He didn't know where he was. No, He wanted Adam to admit where he was and to confess that he was hiding because he had sinned.
And this is the first stage in having a sincere relationship with God. When God asks 'where are you?' because you have sinned, you need to be willing to admit it. Look what John wrote thousands of years later:
If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.
1 John 1:8-10 NIVUK
A sincere person is open about who they are and what they have done. They don't hide.
There is something else they don't do: they don't blame others.
And he said, ‘Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree from which I commanded you not to eat?’ The man said, ‘The woman you put here with me – she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.’ Then the Lord God said to the woman, ‘What is this you have done?’ The woman said, ‘The snake deceived me, and I ate.’
Genesis 3:11-13 NIVUK
This is both pathetic and pointless: pathetic, because both Adam and Eve were big enough to do the crime but not big enough to do the time; pointless, because God is all-seeing and all-knowing. Of course He knows who did what!
Sincere people also don't try to use religious observance as a veneer for sin, like King Saul did:
When Samuel reached him, Saul said, ‘The Lord bless you! I have carried out the Lord’s instructions.’ But Samuel said, ‘What then is this bleating of sheep in my ears? What is this lowing of cattle that I hear?’ Saul answered, ‘The soldiers brought them from the Amalekites; they spared the best of the sheep and cattle to sacrifice to the Lord your God, but we totally destroyed the rest.’
1 Samuel 15:13-15 NIVUK
Saul had been commanded to wipe out the Amalekites and all that belonged to them. Yet he disobeyed and used religious ritual to try and get away with it. But God was not fooled. And because of this, he lost the right to be king (1 Samuel 15:22-23).
A sincere believer is open and honest before God about their sins and weaknesses and failings because they recognise that this is how they should be, and it is pointless to be any different.
That means that a sincere believer doesn't use their religion to get away with sin, or spiritualise their mistakes, or use temporary obedience to bribe God into blessing them.
Yet how many times do we see this in the Bible? God's people made this mistake time and time again. We see the first sign of it when Moses is on Mount Sinai, receiving instructions on how to worship God and honour Him, while Aaron is making an idol for the people to worship, just like the pagan nations around them, and providing the most imperfect, implausible excuse for it (Exodus 32:22-24). I guess he never realised that you really do need to be sincere with God, because this is the opposite of sincere.
What the Israelites did at the base of Mount Sinai sets a pattern for misbehaviour that continued right until they lost their Temple and their land:
So the next day the people rose early and sacrificed burnt offerings and presented fellowship offerings. Afterwards they sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry.
Exodus 32:6 NIVUK
They used the rituals and rites of their religion to try to bribe God into letting them away with rampant idolatry and debauchery. It clearly didn't work (Exodus 32:25-35).
However, they kept on doing it. But - and this is a stern warning for us - God was not fooled. God was never fooled. Not once.
‘Shout it aloud, do not hold back. Raise your voice like a trumpet. Declare to my people their rebellion and to the descendants of Jacob their sins. For day after day they seek me out; they seem eager to know my ways, as if they were a nation that does what is right and has not forsaken the commands of its God. They ask me for just decisions and seem eager for God to come near them. “Why have we fasted,” they say, “and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you have not noticed?” ‘Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please and exploit all your workers. Your fasting ends in quarrelling and strife, and in striking each other with wicked fists. You cannot fast as you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high.
Isaiah 58:1-4 NIVUK
And worse, later on, despite their sin, they actually had the cheek to blame God when their lives went wrong! Again, God would have none of it (Jeremiah 44).
It got worse. When they were punished because of their sin and then, by the grace of God, they returned to their land, their worship became half-hearted, routine and utterly insincere:
‘A son honours his father, and a slave his master. If I am a father, where is the honour due to me? If I am a master, where is the respect due to me?’ says the Lord Almighty. ‘It is you priests who show contempt for my name. ‘But you ask, “How have we shown contempt for your name?” ‘By offering defiled food on my altar. ‘But you ask, “How have we defiled you?” ‘By saying that the Lord’s table is contemptible. When you offer blind animals for sacrifice, is that not wrong? When you sacrifice lame or diseased animals, is that not wrong? Try offering them to your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you?’ says the Lord Almighty. ‘Now plead with God to be gracious to us. With such offerings from your hands, will he accept you?’ – says the Lord Almighty. ‘Oh, that one of you would shut the temple doors, so that you would not light useless fires on my altar! I am not pleased with you,’ says the Lord Almighty, ‘and I will accept no offering from your hands. My name will be great among the nations, from where the sun rises to where it sets. In every place incense and pure offerings will be brought to me, because my name will be great among the nations,’ says the Lord Almighty. ‘But you profane it by saying, “The Lord’s table is defiled,” and, “Its food is contemptible.” And you say, “What a burden!” and you sniff at it contemptuously,’ says the Lord Almighty. ‘When you bring injured, lame or diseased animals and offer them as sacrifices, should I accept them from your hands?’ says the Lord. ‘Cursed is the cheat who has an acceptable male in his flock and vows to give it, but then sacrifices a blemished animal to the Lord. For I am a great king,’ says the Lord Almighty, ‘and my name is to be feared among the nations.
Malachi 1:6-14 NIVUK
What a passage! It's no wonder that God then took the radical step of not sending them any prophets or preachers of the Word of God for four hundred years:
‘The days are coming,’ declares the Sovereign Lord, ‘when I will send a famine through the land – not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord. People will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the Lord, but they will not find it.
Amos 8:11-12 NIVUK
Let's look at the downward slide here. Firstly you have naked self-interest (literally) in the meeting place with God. This is followed by open duplicity and double-mindedness: the use of ritual and religion to cover heinous sin. What follows that is punishment and discipline from God, and the point of view that ritual and religion are useless because those who follow it aren't getting what they want. It then ends in contempt for religion and silence from God.
That's not anti-Semitism. Far from it. What we see there is not just the nature of the Jews. No, it's human nature.
So how do we avoid this slide into despair?
Sincerity.
Who may ascend the mountain of the Lord? Who may stand in his holy place? The one who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not trust in an idol or swear by a false god.
Psalms 24:3-4 NIVUK
Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
Psalms 51:10 NIVUK
Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshippers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshippers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshippers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.’
John 4:23-24 NIVUK
We remove self-interest from the reasons why we come to God in our quiet time. We don't do it out of routine or habit. We don't do it as a good luck charm. We don't do it because we'd feel bad if we don't. We do it to be with God, to spend time with Him and to hear from Him.
If we do it for any other self-centred eason, then we can quickly find ourselves on the slippery slope to silence from God.
Jesus Himself taught these words:
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.
Matthew 5:8 NIVUK
Intentions matter.
Think about this. We often sing 'What a friend we have in Jesus', which is true. But how good a friend are we to Him? How would we react if we had a so-called friend who was only interested in meeting us for self-centred reasons or because they wanted something from us or purely out of habit?
The slide away from God doesn't begin when we stop meeting with God in our quiet times, or even in church. It begins when our motivation changes: when we stop truly worshipping Him, dethrone Him and enthrone ourselves and what we want; when we stop seeking His kingdom and rule and start to seek our own. Once that happens, we want God on our terms, to do the things we want, and disappointment and disenchantment flood in when what we want doesn't happen.
Unless the downward slide is halted, it's just a matter of time before we stop meeting with Him at all.
And then, when God is silent, we will have no-one to blame but ourselves.
So let me ask you this challenging question: why do you want to have a quiet time?
Questions:
Why do you want to have a quiet time? What are your reasons for wanting to meet with Jesus?
Do you agree that sincerity is important, even in a private meeting with God that no-one else sees?
What steps will you take to ensure that you never find yourself on the slippery slope away from God?
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