More Than Doing Things for God · Day 3
Sincerity Is Not a Compass
By Wolisson Nascimento Santos
“For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge.”
Romans 10:2 · King James Version (KJV)
This is what is most unsettling about Paul’s story: he was not pretending.
He was doing all of it believing he was pleasing God — and he had not yet understood who Christ was. He got up early for God. He spent his life for God. He confronted people for God. And he was going the wrong way with his whole heart.
Years later, writing to the Romans about his own people, he acknowledges their zeal for God. He also acknowledges what is missing: knowledge. He knows how a sincere conviction can need correction.
If you have ever feared being sincere and wrong at the same time, that fear has a place in the Bible. The answer is not to run harder. It is to come closer. That includes listening to the Word with a willingness to change your mind, admit a mistake, and repair the harm it caused.
Is there a conviction you have been defending without allowing yourself to examine it? Bring that question to God. Those who love the truth do not need to fear it.
The context
Romans 10 is Paul speaking about his own people, and speaking in pain — in the verse before he says his heart's desire is that they be saved. It is not an attack. It is someone who has stood exactly there, describing from the inside what it is to have zeal without knowledge.
He knows because he was there. In Philippians 3:6, the word “zeal” sits right next to “persecuting the church”.
Did you know?
Telling his own story before King Agrippa, already an old man, Paul sums it up like this: “I verily thought with myself, that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus” (Acts 26:9). He thought he had to. It was not rebellion against God — it was conviction about him.
A line to keep
Being sincere is not the same as being pointed the right way.
Today’s challenge
Think of the last time you argued about faith, in a group chat or online. Today, message that person about something else entirely.
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