Who Am I Living to Please?

By myself I can do nothing; I judge only as I hear, and my judgment is just, for I seek not to please myself but him who sent me.
John 5:30 (NIV)

I was 14 years old when I became a disciple of Jesus. My sister, Jody, joined me in this. This decision was not an institutional “profession of faith” or “confirmation” that was expected of us as part of the institutional church in which we were raised. In fact, both Jody and I had been through that established and corporate rite of passage. It provided us with knowledge. It resulted in us receiving a certificate and a box of offering envelopes. It did not, however, result in any meaningful transformation of spirit or of daily life.

When we willfully chose to give our lives to the Lordship of Jesus, and we committed ourselves to follow His teaching and example, everything changed. Some changes were immediate. Other changes took years, some took decades, and some changes are still in process. Being a disciple is a life-long journey of transformation.

One of the immediate changes for Jody and me was our relationship with one another, and our relationship with our parents. Jody and I had always been close as siblings, but suddenly we had experienced and shared a common love that transcended the petty sibling squabbles, rivalries, and conflicts that prevail in adolescence. In addition, without even thinking much about it, we became more respectful and obedient to our parents. Our parents would later testify that the change they saw in us led them to wonder what was going on, and eventually led them to the reaffirmation of their own faith.

John spends today’s chapter revealing and expounding on the “line in the sand” between Jesus and the ruling religious leaders in Jerusalem. We’re just 25% of the way through John’s account and he makes clear that the institutional religious leaders were already seeking to get rid of Jesus, whose popularity and anti-establishment rhetoric threatened their earthly power and authority.

When I read Jesus’ statement, “I seek not to please myself but him who sent me,” it resonated in my spirit. I find the question, “Who am I living to please?” worth pondering. The religious establishment crowd was trying to please itself. I’ve observed that human establishments and institutions end up serving themselves in what are often very unhealthy ways. I just finished watching the HBO Miniseries Chernobyl. I recommend it as Exhibit A. This is why the religious establishment saw a paralytic miraculously healed and walking for the first time after 38 years and immediately chastised him for carrying his mat on the day of rest.

John then records that Jesus contrasted this thinking by stating that He was interested in pleasing His heavenly Father, and him alone. I can’t help but ponder the fact that this motivation and commitment will only lead Jesus to conflict, persecution, prosecution, and execution by the establishment. That is what John is foreshadowing. This is the delineation between the establishment pleasing itself and the Son of God who wants only to please His heavenly Father and the Kingdom of God on His earthly mission. The line in the sand is clearly drawn.

As a disciple of Jesus, I must answer the question myself.

“Who am I trying to please?”

As a teenager, I saw how my desire to please God by honoring my parents had a positive impact on our relationship and on my parents themselves. I must confess, however, that I can look back at my life journey and see so many seasons, and so many examples, of me still choosing to please myself. The results were not so healthy or positive.

So here I am at the beginning of another day. I can’t change the past. I’m not promised a tomorrow. I have today. And so, my heart cries out in the quiet: “Heavenly Father, I choose this day to live to please you. May my thoughts, words, and actions toward others reflect Your ways, and the ways of Your eternal Kingdom, and not the ways of this world.”