Devised Of His Own Heart

"So he offered upon the altar which he had made in Bethel the fifteenth day of the eighth month, even in the month which he had devised of his own heart; and ordained a feast unto the children of Israel: and he offered upon the altar, and burnt incense."  I Kings 12:33.  Bethel was the wrong place and the fifteenth day of the eighth month was the wrong time.  God had established the place and the time for offerings to be made unto Him.  If we make an offering unto God, we must offer it according to His design and not our own.  We are not left to the devices of our own heart.  Jeroboam had sinned, and those who followed him also sinned.  If we follow the false prophet, we also are guilty.  The time and place of the offering was what Jeroboam had devised.  Man seeks to change what God has established.  When man follows his own devices and does what pleases his own heart, man has sinned.  God is never pleased when we offer unto Him and in a way that He has never ordained.  God commands and man must obey.  Man's way is never better than God's way.  God disregards the offerings which man makes if those offerings are after the ways of man.  We must not follow our own heart, but rather, we must follow the instructions of God.  God's heart, not our heart.