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If you're like me you like to online shop, it's become basically the only shopping I do besides grocery shopping. But the thing with online shopping is that there are a lot or taxes and fees that get added on right at the end, no one likes all the added stuff. We tend to be the same way, we feel that we need to add stuff to our lives to be complete or show others that we are so called "complete", but God says to come as you are.
We are created in God's image, but our mind is influenced by our heart and what we are feeding it. We all have a certain thinking about things that go on around us; we judge others, we think we should get what we deserve, whatever we put in we want to get the same out, we decipher right and wrong, etc. We've conjured up these ideas by what is going on around us, how we've grown up, and what we are exposed to day by day.
God also tells us what pleases Him and what is right and wrong. Try as we might to follow God's so called set of rules we often try to earn His favor in ways that He hasn't asked for, God is giving no form of extra credit to you. God is unlike any of our other relationships; we have nothing to offer, nothing to bring, we are nothing! Even everything we do offer it was never ours in the first place, it has been borrowed from our Heavenly Father. We are sinners and although we realize this we a lot of times still expect something in return. And even though we may acknowledge ourselves as sinners, just because we are forgiven we often set ourselves above others. Say someone murdered 20 people in their lifetime and you have never murdered, adultered, stole or anything related to what we would think of as a "big sin", but you have lied, cheated, used the Lord's name in vain, etc. that doesn't make you any better than the other person and that doesn't make you any less of a sinner in God's eye. All sin is equal and treated equally, to be forgiven you must repent and ask God for forgiveness.
In Galatians chapter two when the Jews saw Jesus as a step towards salvation they took it upon themselves to add more laws in order to be saved. Now in the New Testament Jesus said the only way to heaven was through him, but the Jews still wanted to apply the rules from the Old Testament as necessary. Since Jesus came down to earth those old set of rules were useless. We have the grace of God bestowed upon us through Jesus dying on the cross; our sins are forgiven and salvation is free and without add ons.
Your salvation counts on your faith, you will not get to heaven by completing a checklist. Just like how we seek people's approval we also seek God's; the difference is by doing good deeds we are not going to improve our standing. If you are doing good deeds for others to see or just to feel good about yourself or to be a "good christian" you are doing nothing for God. God wants you to obey Him in order to glorify Him for those around us. Galatians 2:6 reads "God shows personal favoritism to no man- for those who seemed to be something added nothing to me." You may know someone who is a good person but not a believer in Christ and you may think there is no way they are going to hell, you are wrong. James 2:14-17 reads "What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them?15 Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food.16 If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead." As Christians we should have a solid faith in Christ and obey His orders as obedience, if you have faith without actions what good is it, and if you have actions without faith you may be a good person to societies standards but you will not be getting into heaven.
Being obedient to God should not be with desire to gain something our goal should be to glorify God, share God, and bring others to God. God sees us as His children and wants to be with us, otherwise He would not have His only Son die for us and give us a way to get to heaven. God doesn't need us and never did, He wants us because He loves us. God loves you and has never looked at your actions as a performance review or seen you as an errand runner; you don't have to be perfect in your faith, no one is. God wants a relationship with you, not a set of accomplishments from your time on earth. To close, Obedience is defined as "compliance with an order, request, or law or submission to another's authority." If you claim God to be your ultimate authority ask yourself who are you truly obedient to; is it the world? People around you? Your bodily needs? or is it your Heavenly Father.