IS WANTING GOOD, BAD?

We all want our lives to work well, to become better than they are or to remain as good as they are. And so does God. When that desire becomes our primary god, the objective we value most, our lives then become a sustained effort to discover and follow whatever principles will provide a life that lets us feel pretty good. But God, our loving Father wants something much more for both us and Him. And only when we pursue the “more” will He grant the less. Or He might not, until the next life. He seems to have this crazy idea that this “more”, this invitation to us, His created beings, to have intimate fellowship with the Great “I Am” is somehow much more significant than anything in our paltry heartbeat long existence. More important than our health, our prosperity, our marriage, our children, our very life! It’s a surprising thought, and not a little disturbing, that obedience to biblical principles, precepts, can be wrong. When doing right is a strategy to get what we want, our energy is pride and our focus is self. Biblical principles are reduced to the base principles of the secular world when they are followed in order to gain the better life in the here and now that we demand. Biblical principles remain biblical principles when they become guided opportunities for Christians who hunger after God to draw near to God, growing in the grace of His likeness as they experience Him, then expressing to others His character and nature as Light and Salt. Biblical principles have always been commands to be obeyed, but when we are in touch with our Savior’s heart, they are also seen as privileges we long to seize.