What God demands from people: integrity

The right attitude towards sinning.

God wants every individual to realize that He has created him or her for a definite purpose and that people must serve the purpose for which they have been created. The Bible makes the purpose for which people have been created crystal clear: a perfect and eternal human life in accordance with God’s definition of a perfect and eternal human life. Everything that does not contribute to achieving the purpose for which people have been created is called sin in the Bible and is rejected by God.

People should also realize that they have been created according to God’s image and in His likeness and have the duty to reflect the glory and the perfection of their heavenly Father. Humans should want to look like God like children want to look like their parents.

Sin places the will of the created being opposite the will of the Creator. It is a form of rebellion against God’s sovereignty. It is a demonstration of a mental attitude that considers it possible that man knows better what is good for him than his creator.

And in particular: sin is a demonstration of a lack of love and appreciation for everything that the Creator is, everything the Creator has done and everything the Creator intends to do in the future.

Integrity.

The Bible teaches that every human sins and that no person can remain completely free from sin. But this does not contradict the fact that the Bible also teaches that, in spite of their sinfulness, people can have a right attitude to life: an attitude to life that is characterized by an unbreakable devotion to God, to God’s will and to God’s intentions. Even sinful people can keep their integrity towards God by using their life as much as possible to serve God and by doing all they can to know God’s will and to do God’s will.

This means that integrity towards God does not require moral perfection: it requires a pure heart with which people can obey what according to Christ is the greatest commandment: love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, your whole mind, your whole soul and all your strength.

Making God find pleasure in you.

Parents can find intense pleasure in their children. In the same way God can find intense pleasure in His human children. Parents rejoice when they see how their children love them and do the good things that they have taught them to do. In the same way God experiences joy when He sees that His human children appreciate Him as their Father and do their utmost to follow His fatherly advice.

On the other hand: when human children do not appreciate their heavenly father, refuse to do the good things He has taught them to do and intentionally make other people suffer….all this causes God to feel grief and disappointment.

Within this context one can think of the people of Israel about whom God often said that they were stiff-necked and characterized by a heart of stone.