Why Should I Care?

Indifference. Mediocrity. Good enough. It just simply doesn’t matter.

Whether through actions, or through words, all of these sentiments point toward the same root problem: A lack of concern. Granted, there are some aspects of life in which a lack of concern doesn’t make a huge impact. What or where to eat for dinner is a question which often receives the “it doesn’t matter to me” treatment. Unfortunately, many flippantly apply the same logic to religion.

Why does it matter what I believe? What difference does it make whether I choose to obey or disobey God? Why should I care?

When we can’t find motivation within ourselves to care about something, sometimes it helps to look at why other people care or have cared about the same thing. If it was real to someone else, what could make it real to us?

There are many external things we could look at, i.e. the existence of God, the inspiration of the Bible, archeology, etc. which all should give us a reason to be concerned. If God does exist, his demands of us are real, and so are the consequences. For the sake of simplicity, though, I’d like to simply take a walk through the scriptures, and look at some internal reasons.

From the very outset of the scriptures we are confronted with men and women whose lives were greatly impacted by God’s plan for saving mankind through his Son. Peter writes the following about the prophets of the Old Testament:

1 Peter 1:10-12 NKJV
(10)  Of this salvation the prophets have inquired and searched carefully, who prophesied of the grace that would come to you,
(11)  searching what, or what manner of time, the Spirit of Christ who was in them was indicating when He testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow.
(12)  To them it was revealed that, not to themselves, but to us they were ministering the things which now have been reported to you through those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven--things which angels desire to look into.

These men were not mere characters in a literary work. These were real, historical people! They were part of God’s working, for our benefit. They made real, fulfilled, prophecies concerning the coming Messiah (study Psalm 22, Isaiah 53, just to name a couple obvious ones) hundreds of years before these prophecies came to fruition. Many even died because of what they were doing (cf. Matthew 23:3; 2 Chronicles 24:20-21). These people never even saw the fulfillment of the predictions the Holy Spirit made through them!

The most compelling thing about their situation? They acted, yet didn’t know all of the particulars of God’s plan! By the way, it was all to benefit you and me.

The Hebrew writer further comments “And all these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise,”(Hebrews 11:39). If these people could care enough to follow the commands of God, despite never seeing the fruition of those plans, why can’t I care?

~Daniel Howell

P.S. – Come back next week as we continue this thought, “Why Should I Care?”