It’s Always Better to Choose God

text:HEBREWS 11:24-26

24 By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. 25 He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. 26 He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.

Moses esteemed suffering, rejection, and persecution as being more valuable than all the treasures of Egypt. This was no small deal. He was second in command of the world superpower of his day. Secular history records that Moses went out and defeated the Ethiopians. He was a general who held a great position of authority, but he esteemed God will above all this wealth and power

What Do You Respect?

If you were put in that position, it’d be a struggle for you to identify with the slaves. If God said, “These Egyptian you grew up with aren’t really your people,” you’d probably muggle. Why? Because you’d say, “Oh Lord, look what I’d be giving up!" The reason you sometimes struggle to do GOd's will is because of the value you place on other things.

Moses was able to do it because he determined in his heart that, “Doing God’s will means much more to me than losing the throne. Suffering with Christ and giving up this power and wealth pales in comparison to my reward. Even if I have to go out into the wilderness for forty years, He’s worth more. Fulfilling my God’given destiny is more valuable to me than all that Egypt could offer.” That’s the reason he could do it. '

Sometimes we look at people who have made great sacrifices and wonder, How could tbey do it? Well, they couldn’t with some people’s values! People generally will do what they value, prize, and respect the most. Therefore, the problem isn't knowing what the right thing to do is. It’s that our values are so skewed that we can’t make the right decision to do it because we feel we’re losing so much.

It appeared as if Moses was losing everything, but he looked beyond that. He had “respect” unto his reward. text:HEBREWS 1126

26 He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.

Respect means “to turn the eyes away from other things and fix them on some one thing.” Moses looked away from everything but his reward. In other words, he refused to sit down, count, and dwell on all the different things he was giving up. He turned away from everything and became single-minded on what God had promised him. If he hadn’t, you probably never would have heard of Moses.

Choosing God always, always, always works out to your best interests. It looked like Moses was giving up a lot, but he chose God and changed the course of the entire world. There isn’t a Christian on the planet today who hasn’t heard the name of Moses. Most secular, Jewish, and Muslim people have heard his name too. Almost everybody has heard of Moses! But no one would have heard of him in this day and age if he had chosen the riches of Egypt instead. Moses made the better choice. When you choose God’s way, it’ll always work out better for you in the end. But the problem is we say, “Lord, if I do what You’re asking me to do, I’ll have to give up this and that!”

“No Way”

It’s always better to choose God. You just need to change your value system and disesteem everything else. Get to a place
where you look away from anything except the Lord. Say, “Father, You are all I want. Your will is all I need in my life.”

Paul Counted

Paul considered everything he had as worthless compared to knowing God. He wasn’t talking about all of his failures and the things he did wrong. Paul was referring to all of his education, degrees, and accomplishments. Paul was probably one of the most educated men of his day. He was the up and coming rabbi in the nation of Israel. He had all these things going for him in the natural.

But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ.

text:PHILIPPIANS 3:7,8

7 But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. 8 Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ

“Count” here is the same Greek word used in text:HEBREWS 11:26

26 He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.

for “esteeming, where the Bible says that Moses esteemed the persecution that came with serving God as greater riches than all of Egypt’s treasures.

Paul valued God and disesteemed everything else. The worth he placed on all of his education and accomplishments was equal to dung. Do you know what we do with our dung? We frame it and put it on the wall.