What are you giving to God?

Psalm 50:8-10  " 'I do not rebuke you for your sacrifices, or your burnt offerings, which are ever before Me.  I have no need of a bull from your stall or of goats from your pens, for every animal of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills.' "

God is speaking to His people about their acts of worship.  He acknowledges and praises their constant efforts to follow instructions by offering sacrifices and burnt offerings.  But He also reminds them that the ritual is not the main point.  The ritual does not provide God with what He truly wants from us. As He says, what use does He have for an animal sacrifice?  It's a nice gesture, but we are simply giving Him what is already His ("for every animal of the forest is Mine...") 

The point of all the ritual is the attitude with which we perform the ritual.  If there is nothing going on in our hearts while we follow the letter of God's law, we might as well not follow it at all.  The most common illustration of this for us is church attendance.  If we think that our mere physical presence in church service is truly pleasing to God, we miss the point.

God wants our love and worship.  Going to church should be a conscious act of love and worship toward God.  Otherwise, we have only made ourselves feel better about our performance and discipline.  If those two things got us anywhere close to our eternal goal, God Himself would not have had to come to earth and die to rescue us.