“For
whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My
sake, he is the one who will save it.
For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world and loses or
forfeits himself? (Luke 9:24-25).
Hey Gang: I have learned, in my sojourn on this earth,
that “if” (there is one of those little words
you need to pay attention to) you want
to have a life filled with joy, peace and comfort, then give your life away to God.
I have heard it said that this
person or that person has a lot of potential, yet they do not succeed or
develop that potential. So, I have
modified that statement by saying there is a prerequisite to developing
potential – ambition. Ambition is
natural and is the catalyst to developing potential. There can be no success without getting up
from our lounge chair and developing the God-given talent that He gave us.
Do we not all want to succeed, have
a happy family life, friendships, financial security and good health? In other words, do we all not want want a
great life?
In our Scripture of the day, Jesus
taught about the great irony of ambition – He said, “You have to lose your life in order to gain it”. This places you in the choosing mode; you must answer the question, is my physical
life more important than my eternal soul?
Jesus taught that gaining everything on earth
– all those things that are supposed to make us happy - will still leave you
emotionally bankrupt, if you don’t have a spiritual relationship with God. God wants you to live with ambition and
purpose, but He doesn’t want your focus to be self-centered and self-directed. Let God be your priority. Jesus' counsel to his children is- “IF” you let
living in His Kingdom be your ambition, you will find the peace that surpasses
understanding.
Recently, I watched the professional
football draft. Thirty two young men became very rich, very
rapidly. Now, if you would ask them,
money was not the driving force but rather their love of football. That may be a driving force today, but when
it comes to contract time – that suddenly changes and greed becomes the driving
force. But I also suspect there may be a
wee bit or 'power' connected to the attitude of the super stars of this world.
I also suspect that the bangles and
beads of this world often becomes the driving force in our lives, not loving God,
and our neighbor as our selves. Many miss Jesus' warning, “What profit is there if you gain the whole world and lose or forfeit yourself.”
Soooo, my young friends, today the
news reported that a young man, who had all the potential in the world as a
football player, developed that talent to the point where he became a Hall of
Fame type linebacker, killed himself.
Perhaps he never heard that Jesus “..is
the way, and the truth and life, no one comes to the Father but through Him”.
(John 14:6
No comments:
Post a Comment