Motives

Why do you do what you do? If you go to visit a friend in the hospital or sign the book at a funeral visitation or prepare a meal for someone, do you stop long enough to ask yourself why you are doing it?

In preparing for this Sunday’s lesson in our high school class, I came across this quote – “People are always motivated by at least two reasons: the one they tell you about and a secret one.” (O.A. Battista)

I’ve had to think through that a few times. Granted, there are times that we do something for other people out of the kindness of our hearts. They have a need that we are able to meet and we are moved to meet whatever that need is.

But I think there are also times where we might do something without the purest of motives. We may offer to meet that need knowing that we are supposed to do that or it presents a good image of who we are. We want people to think we are generous or selfless or compassionate so we do something for others that helps create that image.

In Matthew 6, Jesus talks about our motives when we give or when we pray or when we fast. Those are all good things, but Jesus warns against doing them to be seen by men.

I think the hardest work God has to do is in the human heart. I know I sometimes do what I know I should, even when my motives aren’t the purest. God not only needs to work on our behavior, but especially on the motives behind the behavior. I think that’s why God is so concerned with the heart. He keeps coming back to our motives. Some days it feels like we have a long way to go.

Where Is Your Kingdom?

This month in our High School class, we’ve been talking about the Kingdom of God and what Jesus meant by what He said about the Kingdom. One of the first questions we needed to answer is “What is your kingdom?” While we don’t live in a monarchy or look to someone who wears a crown, we all have our kingdoms – places where we exert control or influence. Our kingdom could be our set of friends on Facebook or our followers on Twitter. We determine who makes the list. Our kingdom could be our real-life relationships. All our decisions hinge on what our friends think or say. Our kingdom could be our job, our bank account, our hobbies…pretty much any part of our life where we maintain control. Once we established what our kingdom is, we had to think about what we do when our kingdom bumps into the kingdom of God. What happens when what we want doesn’t match up with what God wants for us.

One of the first verses we looked at was Matthew 6:10, a portion of the Lord’s Prayer: “Your Kingdom come, Your will be done.” The writers of the material we are using made an interesting point about this verse. They point out that Jesus is using a parallel statement here. Your Kingdom come = Your Will being done. If it really is God’s kingdom, then He is in control. He has the final word on what is done.

Where we struggle with the idea of kingdom is when we aren’t willing to submit our own personal kingdom (or kingdoms) to God’s Kingdom. Rather than His will being done, our will is done. I maintain control, I make the decisions, I determine the direction I go.

It’s an interesting question to wrestle with: “Where is your kingdom?” What area or realms of your lives to do you seek to maintain the control? Then, what does it look like for me to live in God’s Kingdom?