Motivation for the Christian Life
The Christian family is both exceedingly large and exceedingly diverse. The faith of the billions of people who have called themselves “Christian” over the last two thousand years from all across the planet has varied greatly.
There are and have been differences in how they understand scripture, the rituals they practice, the calendars they keep, how they rank and live out their spiritual and moral priorities, the songs they sing, their framework for spiritual authority, their positions on right relationships to wealth and power, and on and on. The list could get quite long.
So what is it that makes all of these people who are separated by history, culture, tradition, language, and a laundry list of distinctive religious practices and beliefs all “Christian?” What makes them a single people?
The most fundamental, unifying belief, of all Christians from across time, culture, and tradition is the belief that “Jesus is Lord.” When you strip everything else away, Christianity is essentially a faith that is centered on a single person – Jesus.
Christians are people who believe that Jesus is the ultimate, the supreme authority, the perfect example, the embodiment of wisdom, our greatest hope and our highest aspiration, the hero of history, the truest expression of what is good, our guide, our judge, our teacher, and most importantly – our greatest love.
“Jesus is Lord” is what holds us all together and the standard against which our actions, words, attitudes, beliefs, and practices – both currently and historically – are appropriately measured.
“Jesus is Lord” also helps us see what the central motivation is for living the Christian life or for being a Christian – the love of God.
Sure you can find examples today as well as historically where the primary motivation offered or expressed for being a Follower of Jesus is either fear of divine punishment or greed for rewards in either this life or in the life to come. It is critical though, to know that those core motivations would have seemed out of place or bizarre to Jesus’ early followers.
It would have been odd for an early Christian to explain the motivation for their faith as wanting to avoid being burned in hell forever or so that they could accumulate greater health, wealth, and prosperity. It wouldn’t have made sense at all in their context. Also, both the motivations of fear and greed set the elevation of the self – and not Jesus – as the center of the faith.
Sure, both Jesus and his disciples called people to repentance, but that was so they could be in a right relationship with God. Sure Jesus told parables about people being rewarded for their faithfulness – like The Parable of the Talents, but the real reward expressed in even that parable is the affirmation from God, “Well done, good and faithful servant…Enter the joy of your master.”
I think John, Jesus’ friend and follower, said it best when he quoted Jesus saying, “Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them” (John 14:23). The motivation is love and connection with God.
The Apostle Paul also expressed this central motivation well when he wrote the letter to the Philippians towards the end of his life. He said, “For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain . . . My Desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better.” In other words, his motivation in this life is his love and connection with Jesus and his longing for the life to come is driven by the hope of living in closer connection to the one he loves.
Perhaps one of the clearest expressions of the core motivation for the Christian Life comes from the eighteen century monastic St. Nicodemus the Hagiorite who said, “Fear of torment is the way of a slave, desire for reward in the heavenly Kingdom is the way of a hireling, but God’s way is that of a son, through love.”
May you be “rooted and established in love” may you grow in the ability to “grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ and to know this love that surpasses all knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:17-19). And may you love God in return and let that love be the motivation of your life.
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