What Does God Require of You?
I’m glad you asked.
BLUF: Everything God requires of a true child of God will come about as we simply GET TO KNOW GOD.
There are a handful of passages that actually address this question specifically. Some examples:
Deuteronomy 10:12-13 “Now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require from you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways and love Him, and to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the LORD’S commandments and His statutes which I am commanding you today for your good?”
Micah 6:8 He has told you, O man, what is good; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justice, to love kindness, And to walk humbly with your God?
Matthew 22:36-40 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?”
And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.
And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
Digging deeper:
Fear the Lord your God: consider the accounts in scripture where people met God in person – Moses at the burning bush (Ex.3:6), Children of Israel at Mt. Sinai (Ex. 20:20), Isaiah in the temple (Is.6:5), Paul on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:4-6), John on the isle of Patmos (Rev. 1:17). When they personally experienced God they feared God.
Love God and your neighbor: 1 John 4:7-8 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. If love for God is lacking, where do you go to get it? Love for God and for anyone else comes from God. Focus on and get to know/experience God’s demonstrated love for you (Rom. 5:8; John 15:13; 1 John 4:10..and many others) and you will want to love God more perfectly, completely, wholeheartedly as well as love your neighbor.
Obey God, Keep His commands: Philippians 2:13 (TLB) For God is at work within you, helping you want to obey him, and then helping you do what he wants. After Saul personally experienced Jesus on the Damascus road, his response was “Lord, what do You want me to do?” (Acts 9:6) As we experience God’s grace, He causes us to walk in obedience by giving us the desire and the power to do so. Zechariah 4:6 “…’Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,’ says the Lord of host.”. Jesus also shows us the way in Mark 14:38, “Keep watching and praying that you may not come into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”
2 Peter 1:2-4 Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust. Notice what is promised to us as we get to know God.
The Psalmist seemed to know this: One thing I have asked from the LORD, that I shall seek: That I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the LORD And to meditate in His temple. (Psalm 27:4)
Jesus seemed to say something like this to Martha when He said, “You are worried and bothered about so many things; but only one thing is necessary, for Mary has chosen the good part (seated at the feet of Jesus, listening to His word), which shall not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:41,42)
Paul was in agreement as well: Philippians 3:7-11 “…More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ…”
If I have a life verse, it would have to be Philippians 3:10-11 “that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.”
I pray that the longer I live, progress in living this out is evident. (1 Tim. 4:15)
Bottom Line (notice I put it Up Front): Simply GET TO KNOW GOD.
P.S. If your life is not changing to be more like Christ, you are not getting to know God in this way. [1 John 2:4-6 The one who says, “I have come to know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him; but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him: the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked.] “Get to know God” is experiential vs merely intellectual, and really experiencing personal relationship with God transforms us from the inside out.