get ready for another heavy theological post. all three of you that read this.
the question of late has been how, exactly, one can love God for Him and Him only - not for anything gained from the relationship. the aim is not to love an idea of God, a theory of God, or even the life changing power of God. it must be God Himself. Macdonald said (and i paraphrase) that we must not go to God for our forgiveness, we must go to God our forgiveness. this very subtle distinction in motive has been of paramount importance in this young gentleman's spiritual walk lately.
the subject has come up because i realized that God is thwarting a lot of things i attempt to do in order that i may stop loving the things more than Him. and i do love a lot of things more than God - i want fame, romance, wealth, even the emotion of meaningfulness as ends in themselves. but God is the only end, and He seems dead set on having me at any cost. the things in my life which i feel are bogged down, going nowhere, and meaningless are in fact the very things i want more than God, the things i have set before me as ends. Christ says "seek ye first the kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added unto you," but i've sought all these things and vainly hoped that the kingdom of God would be added unto me. "therefore," it seems God is saying, "I will make these things fail until I am your priority." they must die in order that they may live, and he who loses his life will find it.
firstly, i am grateful for God's persistence. the difficulty is that i have no idea how to love and seek Him for a right reason. the motivations with which one seeks Him are indeed like peeling an onion - it's just layer after layer with no core at all. first i am conscious of the fact that i know He will make me feel joy or meaning, and so i seek him for that. then i try to circumvent that motive and seek Him for His sake, but find myself delighting in my own sense of righteousness at having attempted to do this. i chastise myself for this also, but again find pleasure in establishing "true" motives. above all i find that i want certain things in life far more than i want God, and i merely want God as a means to these ends.
eliminating selfishness from love is an impossible task, and i am not man (or god) enough. 1 John 4:19 says that "we love, because He first loved us," and i suppose this is the only proper reason for loving God - He first loved us, and made us for Himself. i cannot, however, do this in my own power and at the end of the day i think the only way to cope is to laugh at myself and ask God for his neverending and infinite help.
if i don't get the first button on the shirt right, i am going to remain in this place for the rest of my life, and i cannot stand for that. but that in itself is another bad motivation for wanting God - i must want Him regardless of where i remain, how i feel, or whether i get the things He has put in my heart to desire. i have to lose my life to find it, but finding it cannot be the goal. He must be.
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That verse really says it: We love him because he first loved us.
"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?" Jeremiah 17:9
"They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed, and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, and malice. They are gosspis, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant, and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless." Romans 1:28-32.
We see our power and ability and kind of love; the love our human heart musters. We, like Lazarus, are truly helpless to resurrect ourselves to the noble calling of Christ. Rather, it's Christ's calling that awakens us from the tomb to the new spiritual life.
"And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest." Ephesians 2:1-3
Our motivations are sketchy, our aims are false, our desires are wicked. Fact. Why shouldn't we question why we pursue God with the type of heart we have?
"But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us... made us alive together with Christ (by whos grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus... For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is a gift from God." Ephesians 2:4-8
So we see here that the pursuit of God isn't any real effort of our own; rather it is a gift that is -not from ourselves-.
"...not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them" Ephesians 2:8-10.
We didn't earn it, we're not responsible for it, and it is not of us, but of Him. Thereby, it is a treasure stored up in heaven (prepared before hand) where moth and rust do not destroy. Thus, the Spirit is just like God, it is perfect, and always being made perfect. The spirit in you is perfect, and without it you cannot seek Him.
"We are not trying to please men but God, who tests our hearts." 1 Thessalonians 2:4
Ultimately, God puts the hammer down on us, He tries what makes us genuine and what makes us false, not as a demonstration to Him- He knows our hearts- but as a demonstration to us so that we can know our own nature. Because this gift is of God, not of man, HE gives it, and He hones it, and He brings it into adulthood.
"Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed. He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Corinthians 1:7-8.
Essentially it is spiritual boot camp. God gives you your clothes, your boots, your gun and your gear. He runs you through His obstacle course to make you a strong soldier in His army. Nothing there is of your own, you relearn things Gods way, and you become in His image. The very inspiration to join His cadre is from Him. God is too concerned with you to give you up, "being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus." Philippians's 1:6
The concern is warranted most definitely, however, what is being honed is neither truly ours nor ours to hone. Rather it is the God that lives in us whom He has brought to manifest. He presents the trials and it is our responsibility to answer the calling, but it is His to weed out the tares amoung the wheat. Should we cease being conscious of the war inside- by no means! Rather, it is to our credit to remember that Gods nature living in us is infinitely stronger than our own human nature of the heart. "...For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything." 1 John 3:20
Leave the perfection of the spirit to Him- He will sift your motivations in His perfecting ways. If anything, ask! "Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat. But *I* have *prayed* for you Simon, that your faith may not fail." Luke 22:31-32. He will make you perfect and sort you left from right. Don't resort to trying to untangle your own motivations. Pray for his honing touch. Indeed, seek HIM first and all of his justice, judgment, and mercy, and all of that perfection shall be added unto you
"What does the scripture say? 'Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.' Now, when a man works, his wages are not credited to him as a gift, but as an [due] obligation. However, to the man who does not work but trusts God (who justifies the wicked), his faith is credited as righteousness." Romans 4:3-5
Don't let your suspicions about the Spirit throw you into fire or water to destroy you, or to charge off the cliff into the water to drown, rather, have faith in the one who knows all intentions, exalts the humble and credits faith as purity.
Now THAT is a God that I love, because He loved me (even before I knew Him) enough to accept I am flawed, but willing to cut every corner necessary to make me His own righteous son
yea! i was mentioned in this blog! i'm one of the three!
i think this is the issue that paul referred to as "seeing dimly". we can see and understand what perfect love is or should be, but can't attain yet.
the journey is always more important than the destination (sorry for the lame cliche; it's true though!)
you're on the right path - i think most christians probably never experience this depth of passion for the things of god. this is really similar to a core buddhist theological practice; to lose the ego. walking this out will give you such a broader experience of truth that your witness will become more relevant to more people.
it does make you feel really weak to recognize your complete ineptitude as a christian though - i have to go to the place of faith that says god can do all things, in spite of me. i can't do anything without him, so this isn't a new problem that he isn't already the solution for.
i like your distinction of "...we must not go to God for our forgiveness, we must go to God our forgiveness."
peace
# 3 here....
I really appreciated your naming of the desire for the emotion of meaningfulness. that was spot on.
i don't know if i will ever be able to love God purely, without wanting something from Him. I have had glimpses of it. When I felt that God was all I had, his presence was all I needed. it was enough to sustain me. But the crisis doesn't usually last forever and in floods need and circumstance and my humanity. I do feel that God knows this about me though-the Blood covers my crooked back.
i suppose that this thinking brings me to this-that it is my relationship with god-time spent talking, communicating and trusting him-that brings me the closest to him, to understanding God so that i can simply say-i love you-without strings attached.
My 2 cents (I'm number 4 :P).
I don' think there's anything wrong with yearning for meaning, or for pursuing it. Rather, the key to the problem really is who sets that pace?
Up until now you've set it for yourself. You have your goals, your dreams, and you assume, to a degree, that God is there to fulfill those.
Nope, other way around. God indeed has a design, but you don't set it and neither do I, which is one of the scariest things I'm having to learn myself right now, considering I don't have a profession at this point.
Its a process. You have to come to the realization that indeed everything your heart desires is evil. Flat out. If God wants you to make music, your heart will twist that into rock stardom. If the spirit wants me to be socially active, my heart will find a way to justify communism.
In the end, the means to that kind of success is as Darren said: " Seek Ye first..." That is the only path that will work for you, despite what we tell ourselves.
What that means is submitting, it means taking blind leaps, it means doing things that you feel called to do over what you want to do.
My best advice is this, and its what I'm still struggling with. Learn to listen to the spirit within you. REad, pray, study, and have faith that when you take a step out he will be right there with you.
HA! I am person number 5 to comment, so there must be more than 3 people reading!
"We love him because he first loved us."
There it is right there. Because he did something for us, we loved him. Not just because he's God.
I don't think one can ever truly step outside oneself and become this entirely whole being with all right motivations for loving God.
But then, he knew that before the world, and still chose to make us anyway.
My advice? Be still and know that He is God. That's all.
ps... the person above me's comment made me laugh.
Color me /impressed, even when you're not typing in all caps you're one of the most profound people I've encountered.
Adding you to my blogroll Jared... So you'll have more than three.
~ Kili, aka the Songstress
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