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Let’s start with an honest question:
What place does God occupy in your life?
Not church attendance. Not prayer or reading the Bible or any of the other things that people who love God do. But God. What place does God occupy in your life.
For a person who grows up in our culture, the most important thing is finding yourself, being happy and content with the life you have. That’s why we like messages like last week’s. “Do what you know”, be the person God created you to be, can easily sound like “Do what makes you happy” or “Do what feels right.”
And that sort of mindset isn’t necessarily anti-God or anti-Church. In fact, Church can be a really good thing. God can be a source of fulfillment and happiness. But where we go wrong is that we assume God is another one of those good things. We mix God in with all the other good things that help you be you. Your job gives you the money you need. Your family – spouse or kids – can be a source of fulfillment and meaning. Your friends, maybe your hobbies. Maybe your work ethic.
These are things we pour ourselves into, commit our lives to, bind ourselves to, in hope that they will fulfill us, help us be the best versions of ourselves.
They pull us in all directions, so we’re pulled this way and that depending on who’s demanding my attention at the moment. So I’m a good father or loving husband or star employee or master craftsman or true friend or faithful Christian or whatever.
We’re constantly trying to figure out the right arrangement of our schedules, the right investment of our energies that keeps us balanced, keeps our Selves centered.
What no one tells us is that none of these good things is worthy of our Selves.
None of these is strong enough to define our persons. If we bind ourselves to them, if we make them the source of our Selves, if we look to them for meaning and fulfillment and identity, they will fail us. Every time.
The Scriptures teach us that only God is infinitely enough to be the ground of our identity.
Only God can offer us meaning and fulfillment. Only God can bring us freedom and life. Only by binding our Selves to God enables us to be truly who we were created to be. Only God makes us the best versions of our Selves.
