Jeremiah 17:9 (NLT)
The human heart is the most deceitful of all things and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?
“Why do we pray for God to send us the least, lost, and hurting and then get angry or upset when He does it? What is your motive for loving people and being Christ’s church?”
As soon as John mentioned these questions, I thought back to my own “motive inventory” I took a few years ago. I include it here in the hope it helps you search your own motives and gives you the strength to be honest with yourself. Because of its length, I will split the excerpt from my book, less than the least, in two, finishing the devotional thought tomorrow. The following was written as I went through this process myself…
“…Because it’s nearest in my memory, I drift back to the street corner where we visited mere hours ago. Not long after, I concentrate on my motives, which have come to bother me more and more lately. If I’m completely honest with myself, I admit that ministry has become another addiction for me, something else to throw myself unflinchingly into, another fix to get, another way to seek and receive the comfort and attention I crave so blindly. Despite all my good intentions, the things which motivate me to ministry, particularly the Arms of Mercy, are so much more selfish than I realize. By the time Robert invited me to join with him in this endeavor, I’m already hooked on ministry. Like the cartoon character enveloped by a tornado, I erratically lurch and leap all over the ministerial landscape. I counsel and lead youth. Oversee worship and Bible study. Give sermons. Visit with my wheelchair patients when off duty, dragging my kids with me on numerous occasions. I go room to room at the nursing home with gifts and encouraging words. I relieve the sound man at church. I write novels and donate the proceeds to youth and missions funds. I sell some of my old musical equipment to beef up the church funds and give away more of it to those who need it to learn on. And on and on it goes. But something is missing in all this. And it’s the same thing that’s missing now in street ministry.
As I sit here, amongst the loving God and the peaceful pines and the sprinkling clouds, the Lord peels back the lids of my heart. It’s love I’m neglecting. Not love in the bland, watered-down, abused connotation it’s smeared with these days. But real love. God’s love. Agape, the pure love that gives and gives and gives and expects absolutely nothing in return. I’ve spent the vast majority of my life- ministry years included- longing for validation, attention, recognition, and reputation. My selfish, depraved flesh desperately flails for compliments about how great I am or how much good I am doing or what a unique individual I am. Granted, I don’t want to be this way. But I am nonetheless. Before finding the Lord, I yearned for people to witness and experience firsthand the pain and emptiness I felt, manipulate them into having pity on me, see me as the iconic image of tragedy and propel me into becoming the mouthpiece of my generation. I fed this voracious hunger with my literary and musical selections, both of which I was addicted to as much as, if not more than, drugs and alcohol. Much of my misguided motives, I’m realizing now, have continued on in the immaturity of my young walk with Christ. I simply substituted “ministry” for my previous “addiction.” These things I’m participating in for the Lord were disguised attempts for recapturing that fatal attention I need. In my heart, I need to be seen as a martyr, a demure picture of piety, the penitent making up for those wasted years. I seek the attention of people. I struggle with a Christ-complex.
I weep as the full extent of my sin and misunderstanding washes over me. How did I slip into such selfishness? How can I be sharing the love of Christ even as I reserved the glory of such a pronouncement for myself? How wretched I am and do I feel? I can’t believe my flesh has been able to lie so well and deceive my soul for so long.”
As difficult as it is to admit and share this once again, I was serving God to bring myself glory and affirmation, for applause and to feel good about myself. Thank God He opened my eyes and helped me realize that all of this- church, ministry, family, friends, everything is all about Him and His love for me. Have you endured a similar struggle? Can you take an honest inventory of your motives and now say that it's all about Christ?
We will complete these thoughts on the morrow.
