Driving force...

last sunday, our Church embarked on a journey called the purpose driven life, a program by which we are made aware of our God-given purpose in life over forty days, based on a book called "the purpose driven life" by rick warren... just started reading through the book, it's really quite thought-provoking, think i can gain a lot from it!!!

the day 3 chapter talks about what drives us, which i read yesterday, and this made me think... some people are driven by guilt, their actions are set about avoiding confronting that guilt; others driven by anger and resentment, actions set about seeking retribution or avoiding arousal of anger; others driven by fear, perhaps of taking risks and consequences, perhaps of stepping out of their comfort zone, perhaps of losing control; yet more are driven by materialism; still others driven by need for approval... there are people who describe the whole human endeavour we call "life" as being driven by the denial of death, i.e. survival, on either or both a species and individual level...

but as Christians, our driving force is none of these things... or ought to be... our driving force ought to be God, love for Him because of who He is and what He has done for us through Christ, and love for others both for who they are as God's creation and out of reverence for Christ... God and love... well, God is love, so really, ultimately, we can say that our driving force ought to be God... and what more amazing driving force can there be than God?!? we ought to be driven people, never lacking energy, because of this...

but yeh, i guess that's where i know i fall apart sometimes... i'm not always like that... i often lack energy, i sometimes find myself unable to give thanks to God in everything, when confronted by trials i fail to trust and love as i should... where does this leave me?!? it probably means that i'm not always driven by God as i should be, and find myself instead struggling with the other issues - guilt, anger, fear, need for approval and the like... why is this?!? living in a sin-contaminated world, i guess i slip back sometimes into difficulty struggling with these things, slip back to a short-sighted and short-term view of the world, and slip back into struggling with temptation to sin...

how then to deal with it?!?

it pulls me back to a passage from the sermon on the mount (yay for summit!!!) - which i've now decided to make my one thing to work on... it's about mindset, and comes from a passage that's already appeared a few times in my blog i think!!!

Do Not Worry
"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?
"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 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 6:25-34

it's easy to say, "do not worry" (or do not be anxious)... but so hard to do... how can we not worry about our life?!? it's not a matter of simply absence of worry, but rather something else to concentrate on... it's also easy to say, but hard to do - the key lies in the verse, "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness"... just try to think about God's kingdom for a moment... it is hard to think about!!! because it's so amazing, so much so that even a lengthy string of superlatives would be far inadequate to describe it...

"What no eye has seen,
what no ear has heard,
and what no human mind has conceived—
these things God has prepared for those who love him" - 1 Corinthians 2:9

what's more, if you try to contrast this life with the next, our earthly treasures with heavenly treasures, we're trying to grasp the difference between tainted and unblemished, imperfect and perfect, temporary and eternal, finite and infinite... we cannot imagine it with our finite minds... it is only through God's Spirit that we can even begin to imagine things beyond our death, and it is only because of Jesus Christ that we know it is possible (but more than possible, it is certain!!!)... i like this bit from purpose driven life - "To make the most of your life, you must keep the vision of eternity continually in your mind and its value in your heart." God's flame never goes out, but we have to avoid being blinded by sin by continually concentrating on the flame...

so then, guilt and anger no longer hold sway, for sin is dead in Christ and we are forgiven... fear is conquered by love, and God is always with us... material motives become insignificant in light of the eternal, heavenly treasures in our eternal home... the need for approval of others is surpassed infinitely by the justification before God that we have by faith in Jesus... and death is no longer an end, but simply a transition into the life of unimaginable wonder!!!

i pray for God's strength, God's will, God's Spirit, God's love, to always be our driving force, in all circumstances!!!