DOING THE RIGHT THING RIGHTLY

Dearly Beloved, DOING THE RIGHT THING RIGHTLY "[David] said to [the priests], ‘You are the heads of the Levitical families; you and your fellow Levites are to consecrate yourselves and bring up the ark of the LORD, the God of Israel, to the place I have prepared for it. It was because you, the Levites, did not bring it up the first time that the LORD our God broke out in anger against us. We did not enquire of him about how to do it in the prescribed way.’" (1 Chronicles 15:12-13 NIV). How often people do the right thing wrongly. Some do so out of ignorance. Some do so out of zeal. Others do so out of negligence. Each instance does not bring good and desired result in most cases. Rather, they all bring adverse effects on the doers and/or people around them. This was what happened during the reign of David as the king of Israel. He was zealous for the Lord in appreciation of what the Lord had done to him. So, he wanted to bring the ark of the Lord, the symbol of the presence of God, to his capital city. However, he did the right thing wrongly, and it cost the life of Uzzah, a layman that was recruited to guide the sacred object (see 1 Chronicles 13:7-10). David later retraced his step: he recruited the priests that had been set apart for that duty (see 1 Chronicles 15:11-15). The latter action was successful because David did the right thing rightly. No matter how a cause may be good, it has to be done rightly. This is the fact that most people that especially want to serve or worship God do not know. They think they can just serve Him anyhow. Some of them are ignorant of the right way to serve Him. Some are too zealous to serve Him the right way, but they are not, even when they know the right way. Others are serving Him out of negligence because of their so-called familiarity with Him. Have you realized that you can do the right thing wrongly? This may have an adverse effect on you and/or people around you. Therefore, what are you doing presently? Are you doing it rightly? Are you worshipping God rightly? Peter said, "...And there is salvation in and through no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by and in which we must be saved [except the name of Jesus Christ]" (Acts 4: 10-12, AMP). Any act of worship to God (no matter how good it is) that is not through Jesus Christ will lead to doom. In His service, Bayo Afolaranmi (Pastor).