People Pleasing & The Throne of Our Heart

For am I now seeking the favor of men or of God? Or am I striving to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be the bond-servant of Christ. Galatians 1:10

One morning, early on in my vocational ministry journey, I sat in the front row pew running over the children’s message I was about to give in my mind, hoping I’d be able to keep their attention, stay within the allotted time, share something spiritually valuable and have my object lesson not come off as characteristically corny as it usually did!

I was terribly new to a host ministry and church life nuances. In the midst of my struggling to juggle, I felt the Lord tug at my heart. He revealed to me how the place where I most frequently sinned through idolatry, quite shockingly, was at church! I was distracted by trying so hard (and failing so often) to “get down” the routine of the service, the liturgy (which I had not grown up with) and handle the many expectations people had of me. I was absorbed in people pleasing. What a sad state of affairs. In the middle of trying to give my all to the Lord’s service, I was completely missing the mark. I was filled with remorse and asked the Lord to forgive me… and to this day continue to run over my thoughts and motives, wrestling that ugly idol named “People” off the throne of my heart.

The reality is that no matter how sugary sweet we are to people, no matter how many cookies we bake for the Missions’ fundraiser, no matter often we teach Sunday school or whatever we do that might earn “brownie points,” motive makes or brakes the action. And when the very normal, human-nature desire to be accepted, liked, and loved becomes a driving factor (or even a tainting factor) in our actions, the goodness in those labors is spoiled.

We all want to be liked and most of us avoid rejection like the plague. Rejection can rip me off, get me distracted, discouraged, depressed and completely off track quicker than just about anything else. It is terribly shallow and small, and I am growing, but it is part of the weak flesh I am wrapped in. Oh, yes, we could travel back down the road of childhood and trace the issue quite clearly to a few foundational moments. But for me, and you, we gotta live with what we got! And for many of us, people pleasing is an idol to wrestle off the throne of our heart and leave at the foot of God’s throne, under the cross.

While there is no quick-fix for the people-pleasing heart, there are some things I have found helpful in the process of uprooting that long, tangled vine from my life.

Repent of people-pleasing motives every time you become aware of them.
Get in God’s Word–specifically, His Word pertaining to His love and acceptance for you.
Plaster your world with the truth about God’s love and acceptance of you. Stats show that for every negative (rejection-like) comment we receive, our minds require three positive, affirming comments to balance out our perspective. I don’t know about you, but I’m not getting a 3 to 1 ratio from the world around me–and I don’t think we are supposed to! We need God to be our source of fulfillment! So we have to permeate our minds with His Word.

I’m praying God’s love and acceptance to be more real than people’s judgements in your life and for the throne of all our hearts to be free from people pleasing! Blessings to you, dear, sister!

To fill your world with some sweet reminders of God’s love and acceptance, leave us a note on fb or twitter and you’ll get a link to pdf of pretty cards with Scriptures and quotes.

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