Do you want your service to God & His kingdom to be acceptable? It isn't by working harder and harder in your own strength to do whatever you think is His will. Heb.12:28-29: "Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire."
How often have you heard sermons warning that our God is a consuming fire? "Offer an acceptable service because our God is a consuming fire." Or, "Be reverent and in awe of God because He is a consuming fire." Or even a "turn or burn" salvation message warning that our God is a consuming fire. How often have you heard a sermon on this passage that focused on gratitude? As I shared in the blog on Hebrews 12,this chapter demonstrates how the problems, struggles & persecutions of life serve to remind us that we need to depend on God and trust Him totally in all things, and let go of the temporal in order to know and embrace the eternal. We should do so, knowing that we receive an eternal, unshakeable kingdom, showing gratitude (because He has qualified us to inherit this kingdom). The result is that we will be able to offer to God an acceptable service. Is reverence and awe a matter of sitting quietly in church, straight-faced and dour? Here it appears to be a matter of showing gratitude-glorifying Him as God and being thankful. Sometimes that will be joyful and exuberant, and sometimes so amazed and in awe of God and what He's done that we stand, sit, or lie down before Him in quiet reverence.
An "acceptable service" is accomplished when offered out of a heart that trusts God through all things, and expresses that faith by showing gratitude. He is a consuming fire. He is working in our lives to burn every cord that binds us to what is temporal, and to free us to passionately, joyfully, and by faith embrace the eternal-to live a kingdom life, now and for eternity.
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