Monday, August 22, 2011

Ask Not...

"Ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country."
 This is probably the most famous statement John F. Kennedy ever made, and for good reason. It reminds us of the often forgotten truth that it is better to give than to receive. It is certainly good to serve America, the great country that has been defending our freedom since before we were born, but the applicability of Kennedy's statement does not end there. Unfortunately, many people today view God as an omnipotent being who exists to serve them, and so they treat Him as a servant. They do not simply ask Him to satisfy their needs and wants, they demand it, and far too often they leave the Church because He fails to live up to their expectations. But why should we expect this of Him? He already warned us against this in the Bible: "You ask but do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. Adulterers! Do you not know that to be a lover of the world means enmity with God?" (James 4:3-4). Even if God existed for the sole purpose of serving us, it would still be better to seek to serve Him-after all, America exists for precisely that reason: the purpose of a country is to benefit its citizens. And if we should serve America, which exists to serve us, don't we have even more reason to serve God, whom we exist to serve, yet who chooses to serve us anyway? Ultimately, it does not matter how much we have asked from God, or how much we have received from Him. All that matters is how much we have given Him. Ask not what your God can do for you - ask what you can do for your God.

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