Or am I trying to please people?
Summary: Pleasing people is a common theme. It takes a certain amount of people-pleasing for all of us to get along. Yet being a people pleaser can lead to living life on an endless treadmill to nowhere.
Do you know what it means to be a “people pleaser?” I do! For many years, that was my whole world. I was trying to please everyone.
Guess what? It doesn’t work!
Here is a suggestion: If you want to be a people pleaser, pick one person to please and leave it at that. Trying to please everyone will drive you into the nuthouse.
Why?
Because people can get addicted to being pleased. Pleasing people is like giving them candy; if they like it, they want more and more. They sense that you are working hard to please them, and you want to please them, and they think, “Wow! This person thinks I’m special. Look at all they are doing for me!”
When you finally reach the point of being overextended and can’t do any more because you are exhausted, don’t look for sympathy. The people you were trying to please will only give you grief. They want more!
Another challenge is that everyone wants something different. When Person “A” and Person “B” both want you to do different things at the same time, there is conflict. More people means more conflict. Pleasing people in conflict means being all things to all people. That can be hard.
I once heard a story about a man who walked down a certain street and knocked on every door. At every house he would introduce himself and offer the occupant twenty dollars. At first, the people were suspicious, although they all still took the money. Then, when the man returned week after week, they became comfortable with this fellow who liked passing out twenty-dollar bills. Finally, the day came when the man stopped by, knocked, and said, “Hi!” When the residents asked for “their” twenty dollar bills, he replied, “I’m not handing those out today. I just wanted to stop by and say ‘Hi’.”
The response from the people on the street was less than polite. Many were outright angry. “Why I’ve come to depend on that money each week!,” said one. “That’s not fair!,” said another. “What do you mean,” said a third, “don’t you like us anymore?”
People tend to take good things for granted. Trying to please someone with unlimited wants is like trying to fill a bottomless pit.
The beauty of pleasing God is that he is very consistent, and he doesn’t ask anything of us that he wouldn’t do himself.
Application: Focus on pleasing Jesus. Everything else will take care of itself.
Food for Thought: Describe a difference between a person who pleases God and one who pleases people.
Your application point reminds me of Matthew 6: 33 – 34.
One difference between someone who pleases God instead of people, is that we end up serving God rather than people. We serve the one we want to please (Galatians 1: 10).
“But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Matthew 6:33-34)
Great passage, Rich! Thank you!
One who pleases God will happen to do things that help people, but is not wrecked by not meeting someone’s wants. There will be some satisfaction just from doing what God asked. Evidence of sin in this person would result in a change of behavior.
One pleasing people will always say yes, and be absolutly horrified by the idea that they aren’t doing enough for others. Evidence of sin in this person may result in a change, but not for long as others will be more persistent in their requests, and not necessarily good requests.
Angela,
I love this point! Thank you! Serving God provides us with an inner stability that is impossible to have if we are pleasing people only.
Well said!
12-21-2023, Describe a difference between a person who pleases God and one who pleases people.
Our Lord created man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. “ Man ate the forbidden fruit.” Generations later, after the Lord had brought Noah and his family through the flood, He blessed them, saying, be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth, “Noah planted grapes and got drunk, and passed out naked for all to see.”
Genesis 2:15, 7-8, 9:1, 9:20-23
As believers, we have a God-given purpose. God has given us life so we could live in obedience to His will. So we could praise Him and lead others to know Him.
Galatians 6:2, 6:10, James 1:27, Ephesians 4:32, Colossians 3:12
As clear and easy as this sounds, mankind has never had the power in ourselves to live in obedience to the will of God. We need help which God will supply.
Luke 9:23, John 12:24, Romans 6:11, 8:12-13, 12:1-2,
Ephesians 4:22-23
The person who pleases God, lives in humility before God, seeks the power of God, to fully live in the will of God.
Those who seek to please people, always start with pleasing themselves.
Thanks Ron!
The Bible certainly doesn’t leave much to the imagination, does it?
No, it does not!
And with the power of the Holy Spirit being seen in our lives, we won’t either. I still get excited when someone ask’s me, ” Why are you different ”
Many Blessings!