So Many Contradictions!

Do you wake up each day seeking how you will please every person that you meet? Wow, what a wonderful world it will be if all persons around the world could actually do that. However, does the idea sound plausible? Is it possible to please every person and is it beneficial to do so? The Bible tells us: “Everything is permissible, but not everything is helpful. Everything is permissible but not everything builds up” (1Corinthians, 10:23). We are permitted to please everybody but the huge question is, will it be beneficial or helpful to the person(s)? Someone that had such dilemma was king Jehoshaphat, of the lineage of king David. Heaven testified about him that he loved and feared God, this he showed by serving his people well. However, king Jehoshaphat also loved all people and sought to do good to all. I am sure his thoughts would be as most think now, to show love to all and sundry. This in itself is a wonderful idea but let us see how Jehoshaphat walked on this trail. The Bible tells us that king Jehoshaphat had a peace pact with king Ahab (a man the Bible says was the most evil of all the kings that ever ruled Israel – 1Kings 21:25). When Ahab wanted to go to war, Jehoshaphat joined him in the war and he escaped with his life by the mercies of God from the war. Jehoshaphat sealed the deal by allowing his son to marry Athaliah the daughter of king Ahab. This ungodly marriage led to the death of Jehoshaphat’s entire household, save one by divine intervention by the hands of his son Jehoram and Athaliah the daughter of Ahab. As if this was not enough, after Ahab’s death, he formed an alliance with Ahab’s son Joram to do business together. God wrecked the business before it even started (2 Chronicles, 20:35-37). With all these glaring evidences that something was grossly wrong with his choice of associations, one would have expected Jehoshaphat, a man that knows God, to return back to Him and ask some soul searching questions.

Friend, you cannot seek to be a people pleaser and still please God: “Adultresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God?” (James 4:4). You may argue that as children of God, we must love the world. This idea is good but not godly because the Bible clearly states that God loved the world but we are commanded not to love the world: “Do not love the world or the things that belong to the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in him” (1John 2:15). This terrible journey started in the life of king Jehoshaphat when he left his kingdom to go visit a terrible and evil king. Friend, when one leaves the territory God has placed him a fall is imminent. The Bible says when asked to join a fight he had no business in, Jehoshaphat replied: “I am as you are, my people as your people, we will be with you in battle” (2Chronicles 18:3). What alliances have you formed that Heaven is not pleased with? There are so many Jehoshaphats in homes, offices, businesses. Chosen of God but out of sentiments making bad decisions with no discernment, God-fearing but easily compromises, blessed by God but no wisdom, noble in works but rebellious at heart, so many contradictions! The root of all this is because such desire to please people. Paul understood this when he declared: “Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people. I would not be a servant of Christ” Galatians 1:10. Friend, we must run from these contradictions as they corrode our foundations. Remember if the foundations become faulty, what would the righteous do? It is time to flee from all appearances of evil no matter the godly clothes that are worn on them, so that our lives and souls will be saved. God bless you.