Pleasure

To please someone is to cause that person to feel happy and satisfied. To take only one’s own wishes into consideration in deciding how to act or proceed, is pleasing yourself. I believe all too often we jump to conclusions especially in this day of instant news feeds that are designed to grab our attention. Breaking news! This message is all about who are we trying to please.

1 Thessalonians 2:4 refers to the challenge we all have and that is who are we trying to please. “We aren’t trying to please people, but we are trying to please God, who continues to examine our hearts.”

I believe people are obsessed with being recognized. Halloween is a perfect example. It evolved from the ancient Celtic holiday of Samhain and the fear of ghosts and ghouls to now about pleasing one another with fancy costumes and candy. It is a transition from a pagan ritual to party time. Why? Because it is more pleasing to dress up and pretend than deal with reality. Now, I do not want to sound like a party pooper but Halloween is actually “All Hallows’ Eve, or All Saints’ Eve” but where is the fun in that? I believe the danger in marketing Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas is that we tend to forget the real purpose of our existence. In my opinion, we should spend more time trying to please God and his desires for our lives rather than pleasing people.

Matthew 22 covers what appears to be 2 additional commandments to Love God and to Love your Neighbor as you love yourself. I submit that Love is the key to all of the commandments. How do we please God? Why don’t we start by being happy with who we are without the need to please somebody else. When we are happy in our existence, then we can be used by God to help others be happy and that  in my opinion pleases God more than anything we could do to gain recognition by others.

Enjoy God given sunsets in your life and be thankful He gives us this beauty to please us.

T