The mark of a Godly person

UNGODLINESS

In his book “Respectable Sins”, Jerry Bridges talks about how he believes that ungodliness is the root cause of our other sins.

I would like to share just some of what he speaks about in this particular chapter on “the sin of ungodliness” in his book.

He says that we’re all guilty to some degree of being ungodly.

As a Christian, we don’t normally think of ourselves as being ungodly.
Ungodliness describes an attitude towards God.
Ungodliness may be defined as living one’s everyday life with little or no thought of God, or God’s will, or of God’s glory, or of one’s dependence on God.
The sad fact is that many of us who are believers tend to live our daily lives with little or no thought of God. We may even read our Bibles and pray for a few minutes at the beginning of each day, but then we go out into the day’s activities and basically live as though God doesn’t exist. We seldom think of our dependence on God or our responsibility to Him. We might go for hours with little or no thought of God at all.
We make our plans without recognizing our utter dependence on God to carry them out. That is one expression of ungodliness.

All of life is to be lived out in the presence of God with an eye pleasing to Him.
Everything we do is to be done to the glory of God. That is the mark of a Godly person.

1 Cor. 10:31 “Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”

What, then, does it mean to do all to the glory of God? It means that I eat and drive and shop and engage in my social relationships with a twofold goal. First, I desire that all that I do be pleasing to God. I want God to be pleased with the way I go about ordinary activities of my day. So I pray prospectively over the day before me, asking that the Holy Spirit will so direct my thoughts, words, and actions that they will be pleasing to God. Second, to do all to the glory of God means that I desire that all my activities of an ordinary day will honor God before other people.

Matthew 5:16 “"Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.

If everyone you interact with in the course of an ordinary day knows that you trust in Christ as Savior and Lord, would your words and actions glorify God before them?
How far do we go in a positive direction to seek to glorify God before others? Do we consciously and prayerfully seek His glory in all we say and do in our most ordinary activities of the day? Or do we actually go about those activities with little or no thought of God?

For the Godly person, God is the center and focal point of his or her life. Every circumstance and every activity of life, whether in the temporal or spiritual realms, is viewed through the lens of this God-centeredness. However, such a God-centeredness can be developed only in the context of an ever-growing intimate relationship with God. No one can genuinely desire to please God or glorify Him apart from such a relationship.

1 Timothy 4:7b “…discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness.”

Our goal in the pursuit of Godliness should be to grow more in our conscious awareness that every moment of our lives is lived in the presence of God; that we are responsible to Him and dependent on Him. This goal would include a growing desire to please Him and glorify Him in the most ordinary activities of life.