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👉🏼 (Reading: 1 Thessalonians 2:4-8)
📜 ""As for human praise, we have never sought it from you or anyone else.""
1 Thessalonians 2:6 (NLT)
📋 Seeking or accepting human praise is a snare, but often, our sinful nature desires to seek it. The people who praise us today, may be the very people who can reject and condemn us, saying, "Crucify him! Crucify him!" as the Jews did to Jesus (Matthew 27:22-23).
So it is unwise to go along with our carnal desire to seek human praise. We need to imitate Jesus' attitude toward human praise: "l do not accept praise from men ... How can you believe since you accept praise from one another, yet make no effort to obtain the praise that comes from the only God? (John 5:41, 44).
We should wisely reject human praise and strive to obtain God's praise. The Apostle Paul is a great example for us to emulate. He was as human as we are, yet he rejected human praise. In today's focus verse, he declares: "As for human praise, we have never sought it from you or anyone else."
Paul knew that human praise is dangerous for the believer, so he consciously avoided it. We too need to be intentional about this. If we do, we will not seek to please people; rather, we will go all out to live to please God.
As we serve the Lord, we will be tempted to say or do things to court human praise, but we must resist that temptation.
Seek God's praise.
🔑 Key Lesson: Seeking or accepting human praise is a snare.
🛐 Meditation and Prayer: Lord, give me the wisdom to avoid seeking human praise.
📚 Further Reading: John 5:39-44.
◼️ The Bible in One Year: Ezekiel 1-4.