The Religious Trap – Wednesday

Week 2 | Jesus Gets Us

Listen instead of reading

Take a Moment

Ask God what He wants to show you before reading today

Read The Daily

So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. (John 13:34)

Hagar wasn’t the only one to encounter the seeing God in a transformative way. The Bible records many of these seeing moments: Moses at the burning bush, Paul on the road to Damascus, and even Jesus being baptized in the Jordan River.

In each account, God called the name of the one he saw.
Hagar, servant of Sarai!
Moses! Moses!
Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?
This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased. 

But God didn’t stop with a simple recognition. In each case, he gave specific instructions because He had bigger plans.  But we have to be careful with what I think is a religious trap.  The trap is the lie that religion has been pushing since Adam and Eve.  It’s easy to buy into too because everything around us works the same way. It’s what I call the “Do = Be” system.  We are what we do or accomplish. It’s how we feel we can be accepted by others (and even God).  

Hagar was familiar with the worldly formula for obedience—follow or do to be accepted (see the “Do to Be” in that?). But El Roi offered her a new perspective—I’m asking you to do, because you are already accepted. God loved her first, regardless of her works. When God asked her to return and submit to Sarah, Hagar had a choice. And maybe for the first time in her life, this Egyptian servant chose voluntary obedience.  Here’s a better alternative to the “Do = Be” plan..it’s “Be = Do”.  What does that mean?  I get to live out of my true identity and calling from God.  I’m not doing things to be accepted by God, Jesus already provided that for me.  I now “get to” love as I’ve already been loved by Jesus in His new commandment that He gives His followers.  Hagar gives us a picture of this thousands of years before Jesus taught it. 

Hagar’s eyes had finally seen something worth living for. She declared this loving God was someone worth trusting and serving, even if that meant suffering. Hagar’s obedience was her tangible act of love expressed to a God who saw her in the wilderness.

Prayer for the Day

God what are you  showing me?  What am I going to do about it? 

God help me to see one person that I can serve through a kind word, random act of kindness, or simple gift today?

Make sure you complete the reading or comment today.

Read The New Testament In A Year

4 x 6 Plan | Read: Matthew 10:16-33 & Romans 8:1-11