Robbing God

This week I have been studying the name of God, Yahweh Tsebaoth pronounced (Se-ba-OATH) also written in the Old Testament LORD Almighty. When we pray to God using this name, we are praying to the "Lord of Hosts" a God so magnificent that all creation serves His purpose. This is God that saves us in our battles, and fights for us in our storms. We can rest in the fact that the battles in our life always belong to Yahweh Tsebaoth.

I came across this scripture today as I was praying this name and it just really settled heavy on my heart.

Malachi 3:6-18

Robbing God
6 "I the LORD do not change. So you, O descendants of Jacob, are not destroyed. 7 Ever since the time of your forefathers you have turned away from my decrees and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you," says the LORD Almighty.
"But you ask, 'How are we to return?'
8 "Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me.
"But you ask, 'How do we rob you?'
"In tithes and offerings. 9 You are under a curse—the whole nation of you—because you are robbing me. 10 Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this," says the LORD Almighty, "and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it. 11 I will prevent pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not cast their fruit," says the LORD Almighty. 12 "Then all the nations will call you blessed, for yours will be a delightful land," says the LORD Almighty.

13 "You have said harsh things against me," says the LORD.
"Yet you ask, 'What have we said against you?'

14 "You have said, 'It is futile (completely ineffective) to serve God. What did we gain by carrying out his requirements and going about like mourners before the LORD Almighty? 15 But now we call the arrogant blessed. Certainly the evildoers prosper, and even those who challenge God escape.' "

16 Then those who feared the LORD talked with each other, and the LORD listened and heard. A scroll of remembrance was written in his presence concerning those who feared the LORD and honored his name.

17 "They will be mine," says the LORD Almighty, "in the day when I make up my treasured possession (Or when God comes back). [a] I will spare them, just as in compassion a man spares his son who serves him. 18 And you will again see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between those who serve God and those who do not.

You see, I have a lot things that I hold back from God, LORD Almighty, Yahweh Tsebaoth, who gladly fights my every battle, for some reason I am just like the Israelites and feel like I cant give him the offerings in my life He deserves. WHY!!??? I am so messed up! Just in the worship department alone, I am so sinful and selfish and I choose to worship other things, especially myself instead of God. He even says in the above scripture. "Test me, I will bless you so much that you will not have room enough for all of it!" And here I am like, umm naw I dont really feel like giving my all to you.

A couple weeks ago at Mia's church, the pastor was saying how we so often make God earn areas of our life. We say I'll give you this and see how you do and then I will give you the next thing. We give over areas of our life to God as if they werent already His to begin with. We rob God of things that were never ours. They were ALWAYS His. Our lives are NOT ours. End of story.

We serve a MIGHTY God. Yahweh Tsebaoth, that is so powerful that He rules over every other power in the material and spiritual universe. And this God is saying to us, "Surrender to me, let me fight your battles, I gotchu!"

May we no longer rob Yahweh, of the things that are His, and may we remember this week that God desires to bless us more than we can imagine if we just give Him what He deserves and calls of us.

I love you girls,
Natalie