evidences

I read this piece by Baxter recently and thought it a pretty good tool for self evaluation, but of course only those in Christ can fully please God in the truest sense.

Signs of Living to Please God by Richard Baxter (1615­-1691)

1.Live for God's approval and make it that which you chiefly seek and that which will suffice you. You will be most careful to understand the Scripture, to know what pleases and displeases God.

2. You will be more careful in the doing of every duty, to make it more pleasing to God than to men.

3. You will look to your hearts, and not only to your actions, but also to your ends, thoughts, and to their inward manner and degree.

4. You will look to secret duties as well as public and to that which men see not, as well as unto that which they see.

5. You will reverence your consciences, and have much to do with them, and will not slight them: when they tell you of God's displeasure, it will disquiet you; when they tell you of his approval, it will comfort you.

6. Your pleasing men will be charitable with regards to their good, and pious in order to the pleasing of God, and not proud and ambitious for your honor with them, nor impious against the pleasing of God.

7. Whether men be pleased or displeased with you, regardless of how they judge you or what they call you, it will seem a small matter to you, as their own interest, in comparison to God's judgment. You live not on their opinions. You can bear their displeasure, censures, and reproaches, as long as God is pleased.

These will be your evidences.