What I Owe God

Since it is tax time and everyone has that on their minds, I thought I would take advantage of this and say a few things about another kind of debt we all face: our debt to God. Just as surely as 1 owe taxes to the government, I owe God something much greater.

In our society we pay taxes because it is our responsibility for the privileges we enjoy. If we want law courts, judges, representatives and rulers, then we must pay for these things. Even though there are imperfections in our system, I think we would all agree that what we have is better than anarchy, where every man is a law unto himself. Having the good things a government provides requires that the citizens under that government support it with their money. It's that simple.

Our situation before us is similar in many ways. As Christians we stand in God's grace (Rom 5:2), having been redeemed from our former way of life(Eph 1:7) and forgiven of all our sins. What made our situation possible was that God, in His great love for us (Eph 2:4), sent Jesus to this earth to take on the same form as us and in that form die in our place (Heb 1:9), to pay the penalty for our sins for us, to shed His blood so we might live. The alternative was to stay in our sins, have no hope (Eph 2: 12), remain in ignorance (Eph 4: 18), and then spend eternity in hell suffering the wrath of God (Eph 5:6). Clearly, our situation before God as Christians is the greatest privilege we will ever enjoy.

Now that privilege is not free. Citizenship in the kingdom of heaven comes at a price. God paid the most valuable commodity in the universe to redeem us from sin and have us as His own. He paid the blood of Jesus(l Pet 1:18f). What we are, we owe to God. We are who we are because of the grace of God that was manifested for us (1 Cor 15: 10). This means that we stand in God's debt. We owe him our lives, since we exist only by His grace and we call Him "Father" only because of the love He has shown to us (I John 3:1). We owe everything to God, for every good thing we have and are is from God (Jam 1:17).

The New Testament tries hard to remind us of this fact. In 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 Paul said "Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body. In 7:23 of that same epistle he said again "You were bought with a price; do not become slaves of men." That same apostle reminded the Ephesian elders to "Be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood." In John's Revelation the saints are described thusly: "These have been purchased from among men as first fruits to God and to the Lamb."

As a Christian I belong to God. What He did for me by the blood of Christ indebted me to Him forever. Christians owe God everything. Anyone who disagrees with that has yet to understand and appreciate what God has done for them.

Since I owe God everything, how could I ever say that God is asking too much of me? When God tells me to support the work of the church with my money (1 Cor 16:2), is He asking too much of me? When God tells me to abstain from worldliness (1 Thes 5:22), to say no to sin, is that asking too much? When God tells me to let my light shine, to exert a conscious and positive influence over others (Matt 5:13-16), is He making an unreasonable demand? When God tells me to stop what I am doing and assemble with the saints(Heb 10:25), is that asking more than is fair? When He tells me to study the Bible in order to know how to live right (2 Tim 2:15), is God being inequitable? When he tells me to make sure I teach my children His truth (Eph 6:4), is that excessive? When God tells me to practice hospitality toward my brethren and open my home to them (I Pet 4:9) or visit the sick and afflicted (Jam 1:27), is that asking too much?

If any Christian thinks that such things are too much trouble, he/she thereby confesses their ignorance of their own situation and how great it is. Complaining about what we do for God means that we have forgotten our cleansing (2 Pet 1:9) and what it took to make us clean in God's sight. It only means that we have become too wrapped up in the world and its concerns. We must remember that we exist for God, not for ourselves or our pleasure in the things of the world. My first and greatest debt is to God.

We can state the matter even more strongly. If I take what I owe God and spend it for nothing other than my own selfish desires, have I not robbed God? If I use my time, energy, money, opportunities, talents, and relationships primarily for me, and I give God the leftovers, have I not cheated Him? If you spent your paycheck on fun and games and told the bank you did not have enough left to make your mortgage payment, what would they say? And is the case not greater when it comes to our obligation to God7

We all must understand that whatever God tells us to do, it could never be too much! We owe God everything - everything we have and everything we are, in the past, in the present, and in the days to come too. When I understand the greatness and magnitude of what He did for me, how could I ever say that there is something I cannot give to God. What do I have that He has not already provided and claimed for His use? Who could ever think that they would ever get to the point that they have repaid God for what He did for us? No matter what I do, no matter if I give God everything I have and am, I will still be in His debt eternally. He saved us from hell, and there is no way we will ever do or give enough to say that we and God are "even."

In fact, every Christian should have the attitude that not only do we realize our tremendous debt to God, but that we enjoy paying Him what we owe. It is a pleasure to serve God. Anyone who thinks that service to God is a drudgery and a shackle has yet to see it for what it really is. Service to God is the most blessed thing in life. Giving God my all is not something wearisome or burdensome. I'm happy to do it. It is a debt 1 am glad to pay.