Popular culture emphasizes self-fulfillment and seeking your own happiness. But that is the opposite of Heaven's way. Jesus is clear: those who give primacy to their own desires, comfort and security will lose what they so mistakenly value.
The people who are willing to lay down their own desires, comfort and preferences for God's higher purposes are the ones who will find true fulfillment and happiness in His extravagant love.
In Luke 9:24 (NIV), Jesus said
For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it.
In the Greek text, the word translated "life" is better translated "soul life". That is, Jesus is primarily talking about the daily exercise of your mind, will and emotions...how you live your life. Do you live for yourself or for Him?
Losing yourself to find yourself is the way Heaven's economy works. So here's the deal:
- Living selfishly is easy; it's the world's way.
- Living selflessly for Jesus is a choice; it's God's way.
- If you know His extravagant love, that choice is a simple one.
True fulfillment comes from loving Jesus and adopting His servant heart. You must be willing to give up your personal issues for God's bigger picture.
In Luke 14:33 (NIV), Jesus said
Those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my disciples.
Jesus doesn't want casual followers. He wants all your heart, soul, mind and strength. Don't worry; that will make you the ultimate winner.
In love, He gave Himself for us, holding nothing back. It's only reasonable that He expects us to reciprocate. And God Himself sets it up so that you'll gain immeasurably more than you give up.
In Philippians 3:8 and 3:12-14 (NIV), Paul wrote
What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ...
…Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.
Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead,
I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
Heaven's requirement is clear. Trust His love and have faith in Him! Surrender completely to Jesus! You're being called to something much bigger than yourself!
Fair warning, I'm getting ready to step on a few toes, so hang on.
A person with these issues will justify and excuse being self-focused, as if there's a perfectly good reason for it, as if it's someone else's fault. It's easy to lie to ourselves when we're being self-focused.
Jesus doesn't put up with any of that. He goes the opposite direction. He calls us to live a fulfilling life through love, sacrifice, and service, first to Him and then to others. He demands that we trust Him.
Caring more about what others can do for you than what you can do for them is flat out wrong. A selfish, self-focused attitude will impact all of your relationships, including your relationship with God.
Caring more about others' impact on you than your impact on them is not how Jesus wants us to represent Him. In fact, it's the opposite of how Jesus wants us to represent Him.
God's response? It’s a simple one: Quit being self-centered and self-focused. Those things are nothing but an ugly dead end.
Being self-centered and self-focused has numerous other markers, too, all of them ugly. Here's just a few. I call it the "Me and My" list.
- Not fully trusting God, making it nearly impossible to totally surrender to Him.
- Not dying to the things God wants you to leave behind.
- Being too proud to admit, repent, change and make amends.
- Justifying complaining, fault finding and criticizing.
- Feeling that MY issues, MY needs, MY wants and MY fears are what's important.
- Using children as a weapon to hurt, control or manipulate the other parent. I find this indicator particularly abhorrent because it hurts the child. This kind of self-centeredness really bothers me. Think how much more it must bother God.
I haven't yet mentioned intimacy issues in marriage. If someone checks even one of the "Me and My" boxes, it's very likely that self-focus is also impacting marital intimacy. That's another area where being self-centered does a lot of damage to the marriage. It devalues, dishonors, and uses the spouse. It opens the marriage to demonic attack.
It's clear that being self-centered and self-focused is bad. But let's keep going, all the way down to the root.
That long "Me and My" list brings us to the core issue: a heart that's resisting God's clear call to die to self.
Being that way with the Creator who loves you is crazy stupid, right? It may mean you've never truly turned your life over to Jesus and maybe you're not really born-again.
- A self-centered and self-focused Christian becomes frustrated and irritated with God.
- A self-centered and self-focused Christian doesn't really trust God to "do right by them."
- A self-centered and self-focused Christian may look and sound religious while they disguise trying to manipulate God.
Why?
Let's make this personal. Is God not doing things the way you want or when you want? Is He not doing enough to make your life easy, as if that's supposed to be His role in this world? Hmm? Don't be shy!
In their heart, a self-centered and self-focused person will have a manipulative, passive-aggressive approach to God. That person justifies it, not admitting or maybe not even recognising what's really going on.
But God's not fooled.
At its core, this is the ugliest, most sinful...yes, sinful...part of being self-centered. It's the part of being self-centered and self-focused that has to be fixed first. Trying to fix the other parts first is like putting lipstick on a pig. The pig may look better, but underneath it’s still a pig.
Your victory over all of this starts with surrendering fully to Jesus's complete Lordship over your life. That requires dying to self and to being self-focused. It's a path you must choose even if it's not comfortable in the here and now. It's the path that Jesus demands. And you're not on your own in this endeavour. Jesus will most definitely walk that path with you.
- Your victory is in selling out to however God wants to work, even if it's not comfortable in the here and now.
- Your victory is in caring far more about what's on His heart than about your own life, even when His path is not comfortable in the here and now.
- At best, you have a five thousand foot glimpse of His plan, but you shouldn't need all the details to surrender. Jesus wants you to trust Him. Surrendering to the Creator and Owner of everything is always the right choice.
Many people want God to do this, that or the other for them, as if it's His job to make their lives comfortable and pleasant. For those folk, as long as He's more or less doing that, they'll continue "following" Jesus.
The truth is that God often does comfortable and pleasant things for us, but that can't be our reason for following Him. Jesus made it clear in Matthew 23 when he shared the parable of the sower.
Consider how a self-centered, self-focused Christian will react to trouble, persecution or the worries of this life. Let's look specifically at Matthew 13:20-22 (NIV).
Jesus speaking:
The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy.
But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away.
The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful.
There's a huge downside to being a self-centered, self-focused Christian. There's a huge upside to being sold-out to Jesus and dying to self for His sake.
Matthew 13:23 NIV, Jesus still speaking:
...the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”
Be good soil for Jesus. Embrace laying down your own desires, comfort and preferences for God's higher purposes. Put that principle to work in your life; it will be SO very much worth it. Whatever does or doesn't happen here, Jesus will lavishly surprise you in Heaven. Yes, He loves you that much.
Now read "Where Real Victory Lives Part 2". It's more focused on marriage, but married or not, the truths there will make a huge difference in all your relationships.
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