…for what it's worth

Ah, this is a God I can follow! Psalm 50 reminds me of the Newsboys song “Who”, which is probably taken from this psalm:
“… I’m not following a God I can lead around…”

It’s easy, reading the OT from our modern perspective, to confuse the biblical sacrificial system with the sacrificial systems of pagan religions, thinking that when you sacrifice according to God’s law you manipulate him into smiling down on your perverse actions. This psalm blows that idea out of the water. You don’t manipulate God. Rather, God didn’t even want their sacrifices if they weren’t from the overflow of a full heart towards God. That’s why Abel’s sacrifice was accepted and Cain’s wasn’t.

You think you’re giving God something when you sacrifice to him? You think you’re supplying his needs?
Verse 10-11: “…every beast of the forest is mine, the cattle on a thousand hills. I know all the birds of the hills, and all that moves in the field is mine.”

This is my favorite part, verses 12-15:

12 “If I were hungry, I would not tell you,
for the world and its fullness are mine.
13 Do I eat the flesh of bulls
or drink the blood of goats?
14 Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving,
and perform your vows to the Most High,
15 and call upon me in the day of trouble;
I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me.”

God does everything he does to bring himself glory. He is the only being in the universe for which this is an act of love. But -

Verse 16-17:

16 But to the wicked God says:
“What right have you to recite my statues
or take my covenant on your lips?
17 For you hate discipline,
and you cast my words behind you.

We don’t get to play Christianity. God sees our hearts, and is not fooled by how we sing in church, or whether we raise our hands and close our eyes or not. He knows who are his and who aren’t.

His true children keep his word:
Luke 11:27-28:
27 As he said these things, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts at which you nursed!” 28 But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!”

And his true children love:
1 Corinthians 13:3:
“If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.”

And most importantly, his true children worship in spirit and truth rather than merely in word and deed:
John 4:23:
“But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.”

In closing, verses 22-23:

22 Mark this, then, you who forget God,
lest I tear you apart, and there be none to deliver!
23 The one who offers thanksgiving as his sacrifice glorifies me;
to one who orders his way rightly
I will show the salvation of God!