Chronicles of a Journeyman

What does God really want from us? God’s true desire for His children is that they will open their ears to His Word and yield their bodies to doing His will.

Sacrifice and offering You did not desire; My ears You have opened. Burnt offering and sin offering You did not require. Then I said, “Behold, I come; in the scroll of the book it is written of me. I delight to do Your will, O my God, and Your law is within my heart. Psalms 40:6-8, NKJV

Therefore, when He came into the world, He said: “Sacrifice and offering You did not desire, but a body You have prepared for Me. In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin You had no pleasure. Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come—In the volume of the book it is written of Me—To do Your will, O God.’ ” Hebrews 10:5-7, NKJV

We often find it easier to appease God with sacrifices and offerings, including good works targeted at getting in God’s good books. We figure that if we do enough good deeds, God can overlook our misdeeds and reckon our lives acceptable to Him. The law instituted under Moses seems to support this thinking. There were sacrifices and offerings designed to atone for the sins of the people all year round. But David brings us a shocker in Psalm 40 – God’s true desire is not for sacrifices or offerings. Instead, he has opened our ears.

Why does He open our ears? So that we can hear His words to us. God’s words are the basic building blocks of His will. If God’s will was a skyscraper that needs to be constructed, then His words are the individual materials that make up the various unit components of the building. His goal is that we hear and do His words, thus executing His will and preventing us from sin, thereby having no need for sacrifices to make atonement. The expectation of obedience to His word is revealed in David’s response to his ears being opened – “Behold, I come“.

“Behold, I come” is not merely a follow-up to David’s ears being opened. It is also a response to the things written about Him. There are words written about all of God’s children – words indicative of God’s plan for their lives which fit into His universal will for all of creation. It is like each one of us having an acting role to play in the Greatest Play written by the Greatest Playwright of all time. So when we respond with our “Behold, I come”, we sign up to live our best lives as designed for us by our loving God and Father.

This passage from Psalms is rendered slightly differently when it is quoted in Hebrews. The writer, acknowledging that David’s words were a prophetic reference to Jesus, quotes “My ears you have opened” as “A body you have prepared for me”. We can see the parallel here – the opening of the ears corresponds to the preparation of the body. When our ears are opened to hear God’s words, we receive capacity to understand His plans and our bodies are inclined to carry them out as we contemplate His thoughts in our mind.

God’s Word is living and active – not only does it instruct us, it empowers us to carry out what it has instructed. The point here is that God’s goal for us is not to appease him with sacrifices and offerings. If he desires any offering – it would be the offering of thanksgiving and praise to Him alone. Other than that, His true desire is for our ears to be opened to receive and obey His Word and for our bodies to be prepared and ready to do his bidding at all times. Amen.