Obligation to God

All scripture references, unless otherwise noted, are from the King James Version of the Holy Bible.
You and I owe something to God! Oh I don't mean one tenth of our money and one seventh of our time. We owe all of our money and all of our time to God. I once heard a preacher many many years ago say, from the pulpit, that we owed God one tenth of our money and one seventh of or time. I never agreed with him then and I don't agree with that idea now. I am not going to judge whom ever thinks along those lines but I believe our obligation to God entails everything. Now have we paid our obligation to God? I think not! But the Bible indicates that we as stewards are to be faithful to our stewardship. The Apostle Paul had something to say about stewardship in 1st Corinthians 4:1-2, "Let a man so account of us, as of the ministers of Christ, and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover it is required in stewards, that a man be found faithful."  Someone might say but I'm not a minister of the gospel.

But stewardship goes much farther than mere time and money. The Apostle Peter had this to say about stewardship in 1st Peter 4:10,  "As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God." I don't think he was only speaking to ministers of the gospel there. (although who isn't a minister of the grace of God in their lives?) I believe he was speaking to Christians in general. My greatest desire is to win a lost soul to the Lord Jesus. But we are not called to be soul winners but to be witnesses. (see Acts 1:8) This is what Paul meant (I think) in 1st Corinthians 3:5-7,  "Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man?  I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase." God must be the reason for our witness and very existence.

The bottom line is that when all is said and done, we are to be witnesses of the grace of the Lord Jesus in our lives. We are not to think more highly of ourselves than what God has called us to be, (see Romans 12:3) but at the same time we are to know them which labor among us and to esteem them very highly, in love, for their works sake. (see 1st Thessalonians 5:12-13) This truly is our obligation to the Lord Jesus.