"He Owns the Cattle on a Thousand Hills"
Jesus is the Demander. He demands to be first in our heart. First, not second after family; not third after family and reputation; and not fourth after family, reputation, and wealth. If He is not first, He will demand that those things which supersede Him be laid on an altar of sacrifice; He demands that we freely lay down our lives in obedience to Him. Whether we agree to those demands and obey – well, that is up to us.
Jesus is demanding obedience. Faith is serious! Life-and-death serious. Sometimes anguishing serious. We see this in the demand God made to Abraham – take your son, your only son, whom you love, and sacrifice him to Me as a burnt offering on Mount Moriah (Genesis 22: 2). Abraham didn’t argue with God or waste any time. Early the next morning Abraham saddled his donkey, took two servants, Isaac, and a load of firewood, and set off. Can you imagine?
Obedience and sacrifice. God often ties the two together, but the first always precedes the second. Remember Saul and the Amalekites? God gave Saul, what seems to the modern mind, a very harsh command. Kill the Amalekites – all of them, including their livestock. Wipe them out! God had His reasons. But Saul did not obey God. He was busted by Samuel. “What is that bleating of sheep . . . and lowing of cattle I hear?” Saul offered Samuel a lame excuse, partially rooted in self-deception. In response, Samuel spoke these famous words:
“Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the Lord? To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams. For rebellion is like the sin of divination (‘witchcraft’ in the KJV), and arrogance like the evil of idolatry” (1 Samuel 15: 22, 23 NIV).
To obey is better than sacrifice, but God calls for sacrifice also. Afterall, that is the basis of the tithe. We are all called to give God our first fruits, like giving Him our time in prayer early in the morning before the day begins, even before we get a cup of coffee! Now, that is sacrifice; even for some, impossible!
Sacrifice without obedience seems like we are trying to manipulate God. We are bringing something to God to get something from Him. “God, I’ll give you this. Now, you owe me”. Obedience without sacrifice seems like we are telling God, “I’ll go this far, but no farther”. It is a half-hearted faith, a life not totally surrendered to God. I believe it leads to a life of faith without works. To sacrifice without obedience or to obey without sacrifice falls short of love and trust; a life neither holy nor righteousness. To obey and sacrifice is a sign of my love for God and trust in Him. Together they mark a holy and righteous life – the life of Abraham.
Jesus is the creator of everything. “Through Him all things were made; without Him nothing was made that has been made” (John 1: 3 NIV). “For by Him all things were created; things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers and authorities; all things were created by Him and for Him” (Colossians 1: 16 NIV). Jesus created everything; therefore, everything belongs to Him. He owns it all:
“For every animal of the forest is mine, and cattle on a thousand hills. I know every bird in the mountains, and the creatures of the field are mine . . . for the world is mine, and all that is in it” (Psalm 50: 10 – 12 NIV).
What does Jesus own? Everything! He owns my wealth, intellect, relationships and friendships, ministry, hobbies, possessions, accomplishments, reputation, family, health, intellect, talents, the work of my hands and mind. He owns the breath in my lungs; He owns my entire life. He owns all that I have and will ever have; He owns all that I am and ever will be. He made me, and I am His. “Know that the Lord is God. It is He who made us, and we are His; we are His people, the sheep of His pasture” (Psalm 100: 3 NIV).
He even owns my time. “But I trust in you O Lord; I say, “You are my God”. My times are in your hands” (Psalm 31: 14, 15). ‘My times’ can mean ‘my future’ or ‘my time’, as in hours and minutes.
And Jesus owns the Church, His bride.
Jesus gives to us in at least 3 ways: First, He gives us Himself, including His nature and character. He gives us His love, Spirit, power, joy, peace, faith, and hesed – sometimes called ‘grace’, but better defined as, “When the person from whom I have a right to expect nothing gives me everything” (from ‘Inexpressible Hesed and the Mystery of God’s Loving Kindness’, Michael Card, pg. 5). Second, He gives us ‘gifts’ (charisma) like the gifts of prophecy, tongues, healing, miracles, etc. He expects we will use these gifts to advance His Kingdom. Third, He entrusts us with ‘things’. These ‘things’ are what I described above – wealth, possessions, family; even reputation, health, life, and time – the cattle on a 1000 hills.
What Jesus gives us in the first and second way are obviously from Him. I can’t get confused about where His love, faith, and power come from. They certainly cannot come from me. Nor can I get confused about where the gifts, like prophecy and tongues come from. They are clearly supernatural. The third way Jesus gives to us is not so clear cut. In fact, we often forget where these ‘things’ come from and begin to believe we are their creator or at least their owner.
In Deuteronomy, God warns us about forgetting where these things come from and the consequences of forgetting.
“When the Lord your God brings you into the land He swore to your fathers . . . a land with large flourishing cities you did not build, houses filled with all kinds of good things you did not provide, wells you did not dig, and vineyards and olive groves you did not plant – then when you eat and are satisfied, be careful you do not forget the Lord, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery” (Deuteronomy 6: 10 – 12 NIV).
Replace the “land He swore to your fathers”, the Promised Land, with the Kingdom of God; and slavery in Egypt with slavery to satan and sin in the kingdom of the world, and Moses is talking about us!
But, “If you ever forget the Lord your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed” (Deuteronomy 8: 19 NIV).
God has entrusted us with these ‘things’ in the same way He entrusted His servants with talents (Matthew 25: 14 – 30 NIV). The talents were not theirs to do with them as they wished. They were the Master’s property, to be used for the Master’s benefit. And when they returned the talents to Him with interest, they were rewarded. If they did not? One of the servants was thrown outside, into darkness.
Here is where we ‘go off the rails’. Over time we forget that Jesus is the creator and owner of all these ‘things’ in the third category. We come to believe that we own our wealth, or our other possessions. “I earned my money”, “I built my reputation”, “It is my time, don’t tell me how to spend it”, “I built this house”, “This is my family (or my church!), I’ll run it the way I think best”, “I built this business or profession from the ground up. I poured my money, time; and blood, sweat, and tears into this enterprise. And I am proud of what I have accomplished. No one owns it but me”.
Oh, and, “Thank you God for lending a hand when I needed it the most. You are awesome.”
God is grieved when: 1) we forget the Giver of all these ‘things’; 2) when we forget that He has entrusted them to us, when we use them to bring glory to ourselves and not Him; and 3) when we begin to covet the blessings He gave us – when we begin to idolize and worship these ‘things’ – instead of the One who created, owns, and blessed us with these ‘things’ in the first place. He is grieved when we focus on the ‘gifts’, and forget the Giver.
God owns the cattle on a 1000 hills. In other words, He owns it all; we own none of it, but too often treat is all as if we do. This is theft. We are stealing from God – not just stealing His creations and calling them our own, but stealing His glory as well.
Pride has been a theme in most of my posts for the last year or so – worshiping what is not mine as if it were, and finding my ultimate value, security, and comfort in the thing(s) God has given me rather than in Jesus Himself. Where there is pride, there can be no faith. Without faith, there is no life in the Kingdom of God. The life rooted in pride is always a life of fear, anxiety, even despair – the life, now more than ever, manifesting in the world, boosted by Covid.
This is because outside the Kingdom of God, we will always be aliens, separated from the life God intended us to live. And aliens, who know they do not belong, are always anxious – without real peace, joy, or hope. The Kingdom of God is about restoration and redemption – secure in the knowledge that I belong and I am loved.
But, acknowledging and believing that God is the creator and owner of all these ‘things’, not me; coupled with trusting Jesus, goes a long way to defeating fear and anxiety and restoring peace, joy, and hope in my life. It is the first step in a Kingdom life. How do I do this? How do I get back, and give back, to God?
That is another post, but here is a hint. First, we must be born again – justified in Christ. Then we must do with all of the things that sit on the throne of our lives, that give us our ultimate security, value, or comfort, what Abraham did with his son Isaac. We must pack them up, lay them down on the altar in our heart, pick up a knife, and be prepared to strike a match. We must offer them all back to God – this is called ‘consecration’. Peter commands us, “Be holy because I am holy” (1 Peter 1: 16 NIV). The next post examines holiness (sanctus in Latin), sanctification, and consecration; and explains how we are sanctified and being sanctified at the same time, and the critical role of consecration in the latter.
In His hands,
John