J. Mitchell Lane

Due to a few projects that I was working on, between Christmas and a week ago I was only able to get five hours or less of sleep a night. I can tell you that I wouldn’t recommend it for anyone. Actually, it wasn’t too bad until the last week and a half or so. During that time, I couldn’t focus on anything that I was doing (including trying to carry on a conversation). Finally, a week ago I was able to get a few projects off my plate, and I spent the entire President’s Day weekend sleeping and relaxing. I only left the house one time.

I set a new bedtime for myself for this week that ensures I get 9 hours of sleep, and for this entire week my energy level is so much higher, my brain has been able to focus, and I actually feel like I’m almost myself again. Now that I’m actually able to think, I’ve had a realization that you’d think I would have had a while ago. Being so worn out, it was next to impossible for me to do anything with the right focus and with the right heart for Christ. I was unable to put any kind of real effort into what I was doing because there was no energy to spare. Since I’ve started sleeping again, it is so much easier to do whatever I’m doing with energy and with the right focus.

I know a lot of people who say yes to every service opportunity that comes their way. I also know a lot of people who get burn out as much I was for the past month and a half. Sometimes we need to realize that there has to be a time to recharge and refocus ourselves (and time and energy to give to family). Throwing ourselves into everything that comes our way isn’t anywhere near as important as making sure that we can actually serve to the best of our ability and not half-heartedly. Would you rather be served by a million people who’s spirits are down, or by one person who can give you everything he has?

We have to be careful that we don’t use tiredness as an excuse to say consistently, “I have too much on my plate, and I can’t help with anything else,” but we also need to make sure that whatever it is we do commit to isn’t going to bury us, leave no energy for relationships with family and friends, and no energy to serve to the Glory of God.

“So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” - 1 Corinthians 10:31

If we are saying yes to everything just so we can be seen as a servant, or see ourselves as a servant, but we’re not able to do it cheerfully and to the Glory of God, we shouldn’t be doing it at all.

This weekend I was able to retreat up to Frazier Park with several friends from Grace Community Church and just spend some time outside. It’s amazing what some time away like that can do for your mental state and motivation. You come back home feeling refreshed and ready to take on the next weeks or months ahead. We also forget how much spending time enjoying God’s creation can refocus us on Him.

One of the songs during worship tonight was “Power of the Cross”, and the lyrics below really hit me hard.

“Now the daylight flees. Now the ground beneath quakes as its Maker bows His head.”

After spending time out in creation and coming back, the reality struck me again: The God who created ALL of it, the God who created EVERYTHING sacrificed Himself so that I could have a relationship with Him. That is just an amazing thought. In things like that, in little realizations like that, I get a tiny glimpse of what we really have in Christ, and how little we truly deserve. I cannot wait to realize completely how great His Glory is!

Who am I to use my life for any purpose but to serve Him?

“Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing out eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has set down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:1-2

I was reading this tonight, and I was reminded about how easy it is for me to get caught up in the things that are preventing me from becoming more like Christ. Isn’t it easy for each of us to get stuck in our daily routines and forget about the race that God has set before us to run? Just about every day I forget about what I have in Christ, and I take the time that I have in that day that focus on how I’m not getting what I want. Or… if I’m not focusing on how I’m not getting what I want, I’m focusing on trying to find a way to elevate myself above God. Somehow what I want or need is more important than God’s plan in my mind, and in the rare moments that I realize I’m treating myself as greater than God, I make myself sick.

Reading this tonight reminded me that I need to keep myself focused on the race that God has set before me. I need to keep a fact solid in my mind: God is more important than I am. Christ is the reason I am here, and any trials or temptations I am going through, I am going through because it is to His glory. Every single day I forget that simple fact. How would we all live if we were constantly focused on that?

I am one selfish human being.

“A man’s heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps.” (Proverbs 16:9)

That verse pretty much sums up what I am going to be talking about in the next several blog posts. It really is a selfish blog post because it’s just a way for me to get all the verses and thoughts that I’ve been having recently into one place for review in the future. Hopefully it’s something you can use later as well.

I’m not sure how many posts this is going to be, but the main theme is that everything… EVERYthing was created by God and for God’s purpose (Acts 17:26, Lamentations 3:37-38, Romans 9:19, Proverbs 16:9, Isaiah 46:10, Ex 4:11).

One of the major issues that people struggle with (especially in today’s culture) is the fact that even though God exists, bad things still happen. A question we hear all the time is, “How could God allow something like that to happen?” I’m not sure that the answer to that is one that many people want to hear, but in short, God didn’t just allow them to happen, they were part of His plan from the beginning. Is it not from the mouth of the Lord that both good and ill go forth? (Lam 3:38)

To start with, that question assumes an awful lot. By asking, “How could God allow something like that to happen,” I’m assuming that we deserve better. By asking, I’m pretty much stating that somehow I don’t deserve the worst possible punishment that God can give me. Sure, if you’re using a worldly standard, I’m a ‘pretty good guy’, and I do ‘good things’. I don’t steal. I’ve never murdered anyone. That makes me a good person, right?

We can’t use a broken measuring tape to measure the length of something and then assume that measurement is valid when it has to be perfect. If we follow that rule, we’re going to end up with a lot of wood that isn’t cut to right length when it’s time to put it in place.

For how much the Bible mentions how devastated we as humans are, we sure skip over it a lot. The Bible tells us that there is not one person in the entire world who does righteousness. (Romans 3:10) That means that any capacity we have to something ‘good’ is given to us by the Grace of God, and it’s not something we’re able to do on our own.

Since we have no righteousness outside of what is given to us by God, and without Him we can do no right (John 15:5), we are in no place at all to decide of think about what God should or should not do. Genesis tells us that God created everything, and He is sovereign over all of it. The Bible goes through the attributes of God’s character over and over again, and we find that He is perfect (2 Samuel 22:31, Matthew 5:48, Hebrews 5:9, 1Kings 8:61).

If God is perfect, and we are not, if God is Holy and we are not, if God created everything, and we didn’t, who are we to question what God is doing with His creation? The Bible tells us that everything happens to bring Glory to God (Colossians 1:16) It also tells us that God is sovereign over everything, the good and the bad. The chief end of God is to magnify Himself and make His Glory known! Nothing in the universe happens outside that purpose! Nothing!

“For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.” (Colossians 1:16)

Even the highest authorities on the Earth were created for Christ and to display His Glory to us! Even the ones that deceive! “We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities.” (Ephesians 6:12) These same forces that deceive the world were created by God and for God to make his Glory known!

However, God didn’t create them evil, He created them good, and they rebelled against God. Jude 1:6 tells us that “[they] did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling.” God allowed this to happen because it brings the most Glory to Him. The evil in the world is in a sense necessary to show us how little and helpless we are without God. When you remove Christ from our lives, we are nothing but sinners caught up in our own devices. We have no righteousness outside of that which is credited to us by God. How would it be possible for us to know this without seeing what we’re like without Him?

Seeing what we would be without God causes us to appreciate Him more and worship Him, which in turn brings Him more Glory. It is not possible to understand all of God’s plan with our tiny minds. This little glimpse that we have is part of a big circle of God revealing his truth to us in order that we would realize His Glory and worship Him which in turn causes us to realize more of God’s truth, and it’s amazing to thing just how smart God must be to have planned every single second of it!

We really do serve and amazing God!

According to a Gallup poll, 42% of Americans attend Church regularly (almost weekly). 47% of Americans who claim to be protestant have attended Church in the past seven days, and 42% of Catholics. If these statistics are correct, then why is immorality so rampant in our culture? If it’s true that almost half of our population is attending Church regularly, then why is the recession of morality from our culture increasing drastically, and not decreasing drastically?

They forget to mention that this isn’t actually a statistic on the number of Christians. They lump together all Protestants and Catholics into the same group, and call that group the “Christians”. In fact, according to another Gallup Poll, 81% of the US population is “Christian”.

This presents a couple different issues. First, It’s a very obvious example of John 10 and the presence of false teachers and false sheep who are not actually preaching the Word of God, but are instead preaching a watered down version that suits their lifestyle and motivation to exalt themselves above God.

Ask those 81% what Christianity is, and you would come back with a much smaller number of those who can explain exactly what being a Christian is and means Biblically. Beyond that, an even smaller number of those would say that they believe exactly that.

This leads to the extremely skewed view that the world has of Christianity. If you ask someone on the street what they think of Christians, most likely they will tell you that Christians are hypocritical, judgmental, and self-righteous. The problem is that they only see the false Christians. They’re looking at that very high percentage of Americans who are “Christians”, because they outweigh and out-speak the those that truly believe what the Bible teaches. Obviously this is a major problem.

One of the major contributors to this is that the true Christians are so incorrectly focused on trying to get people in the door that they forget to proclaim what Christianity really is. They are so focused on trying to reach non-believers that they forget to teach the true believers. These “seeker-friendly” Churches put so much emphasis on being culturally relevant, that they forget what they are there to do in the first place, and only end up adding on to the number of people who claim to be “Christian”, but have no idea what it means.

I’m echoing one of John MacArthur’s sermons from the Resolve Conference on this part. There’s some good notes on it here. I frequently come across people who are surprised to run into a Christian that knows exactly what they believe and why they believe it. I’m reminded of a conversation that I’ve had more than once. I will be talking to someone who is a “Christian”, and we will have to stop for clarification. On more than one occasion, the question for clarification has been phrased, “Wait, we believe Christ died for our sins, right?” That is the sobering reality of “Christianity” in America. What’s worse is that most of America can’t even get that far in a description of Christianity. It is an extremely harsh realization.

The second issue is trying to do something about it. Since there is such a skewed (or non-existent) view of Christianity out there, what can we do to make that view correct? I’m not saying that if the America knew what Christianity really was, everything would magically get better. It’s actually the opposite of that. John 15 says that Christians will be persecuted for their beliefs. However, most Americans don’t know what a true Christian (not the statistic) believes in, and that persecution is basically non-existent.

I’m also not saying that we need to invite persecution, but we do need to be able to communicate what our beliefs really are instead of sitting back and letting everyone have a false (or non-existent) view of Christianity. We need to weed out the false teachers and the false sheep by preaching the actual Word of God, and not sermons like, “A Christian’s Guide to Financial Security” where the Bible isn’t even opened.

We often think of missions and evangelism only being for the missionaries, and we forget, or don’t even realize, that there is a huge portion of people we come in contact with every day that have no idea what Christianity really is, but only that it has “something to do with that guy Jesus”.

We need to preach the Word through our lives and live out our beliefs instead of standing by the conversations people have around us about those “crazy Christians”. We should doing what many missionaries do every day. When we hear that familiar conversation, many of us have never turned to ask them the question “can you explain to me what Christianity is?” and then told them the truth when they respond incorrectly.

If we spoke plainly about our beliefs instead of keeping them to ourselves and letting the world interpret them for us, maybe that statistic would be more accurate and give us a sobering look at just how vast our mission field here in America really is.

When was the last time you had that conversation?

“For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.” – Hebrews 5:12-14

I was reading this tonight, and I realized how accurate of a description this is of most of the Church, and it struck me that this was also true of the Church in the first century. Many Churches are so concerned about trying to be “culturally relevant” that they water down the Word of God. They spend all of their time speaking (and I say speaking, not preaching, intentionally) about how to have a “better life” or how you can be a Christian and “still have fun”, or how “Christianity doesn’t limit you from enjoying the things of this world” that they miss the point. They are so concerned about entertaining people and shoving as many warm bodies through their “open doors” as the can that they forget what the Church really exists to accomplish.

What does the Church exist to accomplish? What is the Church? The Church is the body of believers of Christ. The Church is not the building, of course, but the believers inside it. It is the people who truly believe the Word of God and that Christ died for their sins, and the people who recognize that they are slaves for Christ. The Church exists to educate and equip each other to go out and preach the Word of God. “For though by this time you ought to be teachers…” I may be going out on a limb here (it shouldn’t really be a limb), but I’m going to say that the Church exists for the believers, and not to evangelize. The Church should dig down deep and exposit the Word of God. It should preach doctrine and Biblical Theology and equip it’s members to preach and evangelize to non-believers through their lives. It shouldn’t be watering down the gospel to milk and not solid food. Doing so starves and suffocates it’s members and doesn’t benefit non-believers because they won’t understand it anyway.

“…the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.” (2 Corinthians 4:4)

The Church does not exist for the entertainment of non-Christians. The Church exists for the edification of believers and the Glorification of Christ. The duty of ministering to non-Christians belongs to the Christians who have been well-fed with solid food through diligent preaching and exposition of the Word of God, and who’s salvation and credibility is blatantly apparent in the way that they live their lives.

“But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.”

“…by this time you ought to be teachers…”

What is the first thing that we think each morning when we wake up? I know that it’s not ‘Great! Yay! It’s time to wake up again!’ When I was little, my brother and I used to wake up every morning before the sun came up. Don’t ask me why, but we would spend the next forty-five minutes or so shouting ‘Can I get up now?’ until finally my mom or dad said yes. We hated sleep so much that when morning came, we couldn’t wait to jump out of bed and start doing stuff. Things have changed. Now, I’m pretty content to sit there in bed doing nothing until I absolutely have to.

A typical morning for me includes hitting the snooze button eight or nine times, finally waking up about three minutes before I have to walk out the door, and then a thirty minute motorcycle ride to work. Instead of getting up insanely early now, I just do the opposite. I don’t go to sleep. It’s much easier to get work done when you’re already fully awake and you don’t have to spend three hours trying to think of something other than the warm bed (or cold floor) you just crawled out of (only some of you will catch that reference). I keep finding it extremely difficult to keep the right attitude when I have to do the exact same thing every single morning, day after day. Unfortunately, that’s just not how my brain works.

My brain works in project form. A different project every few weeks or months, and that keeps me entertained. But the problem is, that leads to me being extremely busy and a bit overwhelmed with all the projects that I’m doing, and unable to focus on any one of them. This then leads to five minutes on one project, ten on another, then back to the first one, etc, until my head almost explodes from thinking so many things at the same time. I have a feeling that also leads to my lack of ability to have a conversation without spending a great deal of energy making myself focus.

For example, in the last few months I’ve been working the good ‘ole full-time job, working heavily on FAULT (which includes editing, business plan, website), getting a separate home business off the ground, attempting to get more involved in Church, and started learning Greek. I am pretty much schizophrenic at this point.

The problem is, there are a lot of people that do exactly the same thing I do. They build up so many projects to keep from getting bored that they end up losing focus on the end goal. Next, they forget completely what that end goal is. What should our end goal be? The fact is that God created everything… all of it! From the ant that bit me this morning to the coffee I drank, all the way to me. And He created all of it for a specific purpose. It was all created by Him and for Him for His purpose and His glory. We are all caught up in that (Hebrews 1:9, 2 Timothy 1:9, 1 Peter 4:11). I forget that truth pretty consistently. I forget that everything I do should be done with the intention of glorifying God (1 Corinthians 10:31). After all, if everything was created by Him, for Him, and for His purpose, then what else is there to live for. What other reason do we have to do anything?

The answer is nothing. If we’re going to live Godly lives, we should have a heart to do everything for His glory. Anything that we do for some other reason is both selfish and sinful. When everything is created for His purpose, and we take something and use it for our own purpose, we’re basically saying, “I am more important than God, so I’m going to do this one for me… after all, I deserve it, don’t I?” The truth is that we are utterly sinful and we deserve absolutely nothing! (Romans 3:10 and 6:23) When I really think about that, I realize how many areas of my life are completely absent of that intention. Why did I start all these projects after all?

Did I start the projects because I was trying to Glorify God through them, or did I start them because I was bored and needed something else to do? Did I begin them because I wanted to point people to Christ, or did I begin them because I wanted to point people to myself? Do I press the snooze button for God’s glory or mine? Why do I drink coffee? Why do I have a bad attitude when I get to work? Why do I even go to work? Am I even being a light for Christ there?

Truth be told, most everything I do is for my own glory which is completely opposite of what I should be doing. I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to fix that misplaced focus.

“For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever.” (Romans 11:36)

Anyone who is a Christian can tell you what it’s like to go through times of rapid spiritual growth, followed by times of what seems like backward progress. We spend a lot of time battling the same things that we’ve been battling our entire lives, and many times it feels like we’re losing the battle. I know that in my own life there are several things I can name that I’ve been struggling with for as long as I can remember. For awhile I’ll have victory over them, but it never fails that a few days, weeks, or months later I fall right back into the same struggles. This can be incredibly discouraging at times.

Why is it so difficult to conquer sin in our lives?

I think the main reason is that we don’t really know how to rely completely on God. For a time, we’ll think we have victory over our sin, but a few days or weeks later, we’ll take our eye off the ball. Satan will tempt us, and whisper into our ears “you can do it yourself” or “you don’t need God,” and we find it incredibly easy to give into him because we’re tired. The second we stop relying on God to give us strength and to change us is the same second that we fall right back into sin. No matter how much we think we can, there’s not a single person on this earth that can conquer sin. If it were possible, Christ’s sacrifice would be unnecessary.

It’s something that I think comes back down to selfishness and pride. We don’t want to accept the fact that we’re weak and powerless before God. If we did, God wouldn’t have to humble us constantly like He does. That’s why we learn in waves. We get prideful, God humbles us, we learn, we forget, we get prideful, and it repeats. The Christian life is a never ending trail of ups and downs, but if you’re a true Christian it has an upward slant towards God. Hopefully, if you’re a Christian, you can look back a year ago or even a couple months ago and point out areas in your life where you’ve become more like Christ. If your heart is right, you should be finding it easier and easier to choose Christ over sin, but at the same time you should be spotting more and more sin in your life that you hadn’t noticed before. It should be more and more disgusting to you.

We try to have victory over sins ourselves, and we can’t do it. I know that I spend most of my battle against sin focusing on avoiding the actual act, and not focusing on Christ. This is the wrong approach. The Bible tells us over and over to keep our minds focused on Christ, and not on our fleshly desires. If we fill our minds with the things of God, it’s much more difficult for the sin to come sneaking in. No one is justified by the law (Galatians 3:11), and no one will choose right over wrong when it is left up to Him. (Romans 3:10-11)

“But flee from these things, you man of God, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, perseverance and gentleness.” – 1 Timothy 6:11

“Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.” – Philippians 4:8

If I were to fill the time that I spend battling the decision of whether or not to sin on my own with pursuing God and His Word, I would be much better off. The Bible doesn’t say “walk” away from Sin. It says to flee, and it says it numerous times! (1 Corinthians 6:18; 1 Corinthians 10:14; 1 Timothy 6:11; 2 Timothy 2:22) We should desperately run away from sin, and cling to Christ without looking back. The second a sinful thought drifts into my mind, should I focus on not sinning? No! I should replace it with focus on what is pure, holy, and Christ. It’s inevitable that when we’re completely focused on Christ, we sin less.

When we’re focused on Him, it’s easier to follow our spiritual desire of Christ-likeness, and run from our desire for worldliness. When we seek to further our relationship with Christ, sinning less is an natural effect because our strength is coming from Christ, and not ourselves. The second we try to avoid sin on our own, we fail. The second we’re not relying on Christ to help us conquer sin, we fail, an the second we take our mind off Christ, we’re focused on what is worldly. We need to stop focusing on conquering sin ourselves, and start focusing on Christ’s character and who He really is.

Without Him we are nothing.

So, this past weekend I flew down to Florida to surprise my grandparents by coming to their 50th anniversary. All of their kids, and most of their grand-kids were there. It was the first time in awhile that they have had everyone in the same place. That combined with the fact that it was in Florida – which is a place that I have really great memories of from when I was little – brought back a whole flood memories of Family, Fun, and the South in general.

One thing that I have been blessed with beyond anything that I could ever ask for is a family, and an extended family, that are firmly rooted in biblical truth, and who aren’t afraid to step on toes to get the truth across. It’s one of those rare instances where hanging out with Family is actually a good thing!

I heard my grandpa preach this morning against the watered down gospel. There are so many people who either buy into, or preach the light and fluffy version of what Christianity really is. There’s a lot of “just open your heart, and let Jesus in”, “Jesus is waiting for you to accept him” and “pray this prayer, and you’ll be saved” out there.

First of all, it’s not that action of ‘praying the prayer’ or ‘opening your heart’ that saves you. There is absolutely nothing about the fact that you said you wanted “Jesus to come into your heart” that redeems you in God’s eyes, and when the emphasis is put on that prayer and how ‘easy’ it is, all it does is lead to either non-Christians that are thriving off an emotional high and couldn’t even explain what the gospel is to you if you asked, or to a whole lot incredibly weak Christians that have no perception of the depth of the Gospel, or of God’s character.

One example that was given in the sermon this morning was Billy Graham. When he was preaching on his circuits, they would actually plant people in the crowd to come forward when they had the alter calls. My grandpa got first hand experience of this. He was asked to be one of the ‘counselors’ that walked up towards the front. They did this to encourage non-Christians to do the same, and there were many that did that. But after Billy Graham was done, and he left the area, you could go into those same areas where the previous week ‘hundreds’ of people had been saved, and have trouble finding a single one of them. Where are all the converts? If so many people were coming to Christ, I’m pretty sure that the world wouldn’t be in the disgusting moral position that it’s in right now.

The issue is that convincing people that ‘praying the prayer’ saves them is the destruction of the gospel. You have to actually understand what the gospel is before you can believe in Christ and be saved. I’m not saying that ‘praying the prayer’ isn’t the point of salvation for some people, but I am saying that in order to be saved, it takes more than just saying those words. You have to understand what the gospel is, who Jesus is, and actually believe it – not just act on an emotional high of a ‘moving’ church service, but you need to understand on a more basic level, but deeper, level. If someone were to walk up and ask most of the people who ‘prayed the prayer’ when they were little, or at an alter call, what the gospel is and what you must do to be saved, they’d be unable to tell you.

In acts Acts 16:30-31 a prison guard asks Paul “what must I do to be saved”. What did Paul respond with? Was it “Ask Jesus to come into your heart”? Was it “Open the door and let Jesus in”? Was it “Pray this prayer”? No. Paul responds with, “believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved.” You must believe in your heart that Jesus is the Son of God. You must believe that God sent him here, and that Jesus paid the price for all of your sins. You must believe there’s nothing you can do of your own merit to the do same, and you must believe that Jesus rose again on the third day and that the price He paid on the cross was sufficient. You must make Him your Lord and your Savior.

Saying “Jesus is waiting, just let Him in” limits God. It’s like saying “Jesus has done everything He can to save you, but now you have to save yourself by ‘choosing’ Him.” God is the one that does the saving, and we have nothing to do with it. We believe in Him because the Holy Spirit enables us to and opens our eyes to the truth. We have the Holy Spirit because we hear the gospel, the Holy Spirit moves us to believe in Christ and we’re saved, we’re not saved because we ‘asked Him to come into our heart’.

Anyway, that was a big tangent, but I was very encouraged that my Grandpa wasn’t afraid to step on toes by confronting that head-on. There are a few in the group he was preaching to that have a more watered-down view of what the gospel is, and it was very encouraging to see him trying to steer them in the right direction. He will most definitely run into flack for that down the road.

In Acts 16, the prison guard’s entire family believes in Christ and is saved, and my Grandpa also mentioned how there is no greater joy than having your family believe in Christ and seek after Him as well. I can’t tell you what a blessing it is to have parents, and grandparents who are all seeking after Christ, and who aren’t afraid to point out what isn’t truth, and then point you to where it is in the Bible. It’s such a blessing when they also encourage you to dig down yourself and come up with truth based on biblical principle and not on conclusions that have no biblical basis.

I can only hope and pray that my family turns out as well as my grandparents family and my parents family. I’ve got an advantage because of their example, and because I was surrounded by biblical conversations. It just emphasizes how important family is. When you have a strong family, and parents that are striving to become more like Christ, you can’t really help doing the same thing yourself. I’ll say it again, I am incredibly blessed to have a strong Christian mother, a strong Christian father, and strong Christian grandparents. You can see how many bad examples there are out there, and look where the world is headed.

Fifty years is a long time to be married, and they’ve been the best examples that anyone could ask for for every one of them. Just ask my Dad! I can only hope and pray I turn out the same way! So, thank you Nana and Papa for the example you’ve been!

I can also hope that I’m in as good shape as my grandpa is in when I’m seventy-three. He still climbs mountains with us!

I’m starting to realize – and not for the first time – that everyone has some kind of motivation for whatever actions they take. The kid in the checkout line at the grocery store is screaming to get attention. He wants attention because he wants that candy bar. He wants that candy bar because it makes him feel good. He wants to feel good.

That girl lied to that guy that likes her about where she was going not because she doesn’t want to hurt his feelings, but because she wants him to think highly of her. She only wants to look good.

I think that when everything is boiled down, there are really only two motivations for making any decision. The first is obvious. It’s a motivation to make yourself look good. To have people like you. To have people look at you and say, “that person is some person.” It is a selfish motivation. The second is less obvious. There are some people (we should all be one) that live with a motivation completely towards God. Every decision they make is based on the answer to the question, “Will this glorify God?” Every single one of us should be basing our decisions on whether or not the outcome will glorify God.

There are also several things that lead to a selfish motivation. I think the most common one is a fear of suffering. Most people in the world would identify themselves as being ‘religious’ in some way or another. If you asked someone on the street whether or not they were going to hell, most likely they’d tell you they were going to heaven. If you asked them why, they’d tell you that they were a ‘good person’. If you look at every religion out there (except for true Christianity), you’ll see that every single one of them is based on earning your way to salvation. There’s always good works that you have to do to earn your way into favor with God. Most of that is based on a fear of dying, and a fear of what happens next.

Most athiests would tell you that God is the creation of man to make themselves fear better about the unknown. If a person believes there is a God, and he believes he is in favor with that God, then there is nothing to fear. Thus, most athiests believe that people created God. Athiests would also say that through some misplaced sense of morallity these people also feel they have to please him and be in his favor in order to get into this ‘heaven’ (that they’ve also created) to irradicate their fear of death. Thus, the people work tirelessly to please a God that doesn’t exist in order to avoid pain that they feel they might incur (selfish motivation).

Atheists would say that people have an entirely selfish motivation for religion. They’re right about that, but where their coming from isn’t correct.

Instinctively, man knows that there is a God. Instinctively, man knows that there is a judgment coming, and so he’ll do anything to convince himself that he can avoid that judgment. He’ll do anything to convince himself that he’s a ‘good person’ in comparison to the rest of the world so that he can feel better about himself. He’ll give money to the poor, he’ll do community service work, he’ll do ‘acts of selflessness’, but the reason he does those is an entirely selfish motivation. It’s the motivation to keep his self image. If he can convince the rest of the world that he’s a good person, he shouldn’t have to try too hard to convince God of that, right?

The sad reality is that (in the world) every good deed has a selfish motivation. (Romans 3:12) It all spurs from a desire to convince yourself that you can avoid whatever judgment is coming. Or if you’re not trying to avoid judgment, you’re trying to make yourself look good. After all, if there is no God, there is no judgment, and there is no heaven or hell. If there is no God, who is to say that there are rights and wrongs? Who are we to say what morality is, and what right and wrong is? That is exactly the crossroads that our society, and most of the world is at today. In questioning the very existence of God, we’ve also begun questioning the very existence of morality and ethics.

When we question the existence of God, there is no reason for anyone to do anything (or to not do anything). When there’s no eternal consequence (as more and more are beginning to believe), there’s nothing to stop them from doing anything and everything to be sure that they enjoy this life as much as possible, because, after all, it’s all there is. There’s no reason not to blow up the building, or rob the bank, or leave the family for a younger woman.

A reality that many are beginning to intentionally overlook, is that this world needs a knowledge of God. Without that, there’s no basis (other than a selfish one) for any decision. However, because of most people’s selfish motivation to make themselves feel better, they’ll do anything to either convince themselves they can avoid the judgment (and thus turn to a false religion and ‘morals’), or they’ll do anything to convince themselves a judgment is not coming and God does not exist. Either way, the motivation is a selfish one. Either they’ll go from religion to religion until they find one that makes them feel like they’ve earned their salvation, or they’ll deny the existence of God all together and earn the same thing.

There is another side to this. What happens when someone has the other motivation? What happens when someone focuses on trying to do things that glorify God? What happens when someone focuses on trying to have a relationship with God, and what happens when someone realizes there is no possible way for us to earn our salvation? (Romans 3:23, Galatians 3:11) This is why it’s so amazing that God has done what he has for us.

A lot of people will ask, “what kind of God would make a system that no one can live up to? What kind of God would make a set of rules that must be followed perfectly (and yet cannot be) in order to earn salvation?” The answer comes with God’s character.

If you have a God who is perfect, that means that He is perfectly Holy, He is perfectly wise, He is perfectly gracious, and He is perfectly judging. If you have a completely and totally perfect God, how can he possibly mix with imperfection? If you mixed snow in with dirt, the snow isn’t going to be white anymore, is it? So God cannot tolerate imperfection. But, there’s good news. Because God is perfectly gracious, He has made a way for us to have a relationship with Him. Because Christ lived a perfect life, and is in all ways just as perfect as God (after all, He is God), He also has the ability to pay the price for all the imperfections of the world. Because God is merciful and gracious, He sent the only one who could possibly pay the price that we had built up for ourselves. He sent the only one who could possibly live up to perfection: Perfection Himself.

If God had done it any other way, He would have had to comprimse some element of His character, which would also mean that He is not perfect. His plan is just as perfect as He is. Because Christ paid the price for all of our sins, we have the ability to have a relationship with God. When God looks at a believer, He doesn’t see all the believer’s sins, He sees Christ. Through Christ, He has made us as white as snow. When we live with our motivation towards bringing Glory to God, and not towards earning our salvation, or making ourselves appear to be good people, we automatically begin to be sanctified in the other areas of our lives. When we believe in Christ, have faith in Him, and strive to bring Glory to God instead of ourselves, it is credited to us as righteousness, (Romans 4:20-22) and God enables us to grow in Him.

In other words, when someone strives to bring glory to God, they accomplish what the selfishly motivated people only appear to be on the outside. They become what the selfishly motivated try to convince themselves (and the world) that they are. They’re not focused on externals. They’re not focused on themselves at all, but only on what brings glory to God. That is what we should all be focused on. If everyone were focused on that, all the ‘complications’ and ‘drama’ of this life would melt away. Because when it really comes down to it, all of that spurs from selfishness, doesn’t it?