Well Pleasing
As a father and a grandfather, I love my four kids and my eight grandkids. As a husband, I dearly love my wife.
It would not be very ethical of me to say that there is nothing any of them could ever do that would displease me. Likewise, it would be unethical to say there is nothing they can do that pleases me.
There is nothing they could ever do that would stop me from loving them. I loved them even before they did anything bad or good. They were merely tiny babies that could not even speak, feed themselves, or fend for themselves in any way, and I loved them. I have made my love for them clear throughout the years by telling them so, and I would like to believe that I have lived it. Loving and being pleased are not the same.
There are things that I stand for as a follower of Jesus, and I desire that my family also stand for the things that are clearly important and to be believed as revealed in the Scriptures. I love my family deeply, but if one determines they will not follow Jesus, I am not pleased with such a decision out of concern for them. If one of them should become a tyrant, taking advantage of others and causing harm, I would still love them, but I would not be pleased with them.
The way some teach, one might come away with the idea that God can never be displeased. Their verbiage regarding love insists that God cannot be displeased with anyone.
Hebrews 13:20 Now may the God of peace who brought up our Lord Jesus from the dead, that great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, 21 make you complete in every good work to do His will, working in you what is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.
For Scripture to teach us that there is a way of doing things that lends itself to being well pleasing to God is to automatically infer that there are ways of doing things that could lead to His displeasure.
1Thessalonians 4:1 Finally then, brethren, we urge and exhort in the Lord Jesus that you should abound more and more, just as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God; 2 for you know what commandments we gave you through the Lord Jesus. 3 For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; 4 that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, 5 not in passion of lust, like the Gentiles who do not know God; 6 that no one should take advantage of and defraud his brother in this matter, because the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also forewarned you and testified.
"How to walk and please God." Our way of living matters as it pertains to God's pleasure or displeasure with us. It will never alter His great love for us, but great love is not a blank check for living to please our flesh as opposed to living in surrender to the Spirit. What we do in and with our bodies matters for this reason. My desire to live a life that pleases God speaks of my love for Jesus. My desire to do as I please speaks of my love for the flesh.
Ephesians 2:10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.
I want the volumes of my way of life to speak of my love for Jesus, not a love for my flesh and its appetites. I love my wife, and my fidelity demonstrates that love to her. My devotion to her and my willingness to live sacrificially for her benefit are evidence of my love for her. Take those away, and I don't think she would be pleased with me.
I want to live well pleasing to God. I do not view such a desire as a religious exercise so much as it is a demonstration of love and devotion to Him.
