WHEN WE EXPECT A ‘PAT ON THE BACK’ FOR DOING OUR GOD-GIVEN DUTY…

If we aren’t careful we can find ourselves expecting a ‘pat on the back’ for doing the things that we are supposed to do…for doing our God-given duty from Yahweh Himself.

Parents can sometimes try to pressure their adult children into controlling their adult children by bringing up everything they sacrificed for them when they were young.

I’ve heard some parents justify their ‘me time’ or time with their friends by bragging about how they ‘pay the bills’ so they should be able to do what they want to do every now and then. Well, they should from time to time, but the truth is that…

Fathers and mothers are supposed to be there and provide for their children.

Proverbs 22:6 (NKJV)

⁶Train up a child in the way he should go,
^[a]And when he is old he will not depart from it.

We are supposed to regularly attend worship service. Sometimes we can act as though we’re doing God a favor when we do.

Hebrews 10:25 (NKJV)

²⁵not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.

In fact, when we worship, praise or serve God by serving others we shouldn’t expect ‘brownie points’. We are merely doing our duty…

Luke 17:5-10 (NKJV)

⁵And the apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith.”

⁶So the Lord said, “If you have faith as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be pulled up by the roots and be planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you. ⁷And which of you, having a servant plowing or tending sheep, will say to him when he has come in from the field, ‘Come at once and sit down to eat’?⁸But will he not rather say to him, ‘Prepare something for my supper, and gird yourself and serve me till I have eaten and drunk, and afterward you will eat and drink’? ⁹Does he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded ^[a]him? I think not. ¹⁰So likewise you, when you have done all those things which you are commanded, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants. We have done what was our duty to do.’ ”