Motivating factors

The best friends are the ones willing to hold a mirror to your life and challenge you to reach higher. In this manner, I came to a mindset-changing realization this morning (thank you, J).

My heart is for the Lord. I long to see His Kingdom lived out-- fellowship, love, justice, redemption, peace, and joy. This is the very beat of my heart. But somewhere along the line, I have become more focused on the antithesis of this. My mind has become consumed by my hatred for what is not of the Lord. At first glance, this doesn't seem like such a problem. Are hatred for the wrong and love for the right such different things? Don't they lead to basically the same actions? Perhaps, but the quality of life and character of the living are so very different.

Jesus, with a passion, hated what was wrong. But Jesus was never driven by hate. Hate was never the motivating factor of His actions. On the contrary, He knew the intimate details of right, He knew what good looked like, and He loved it. Knowledge and love of God's perfect Kingdom motivated His every word and action. If He grew angry at corruption and brokenness, it wasn't for their sake alone. It was because He KNEW perfection, and nothing else would satisfy!

I want to be driven by a love of God, not a hatred of Satan. I want to trade my cynicism about the way things are for idealism about how they can be. I want to trade my abhorrence of brokenness for the knowledge and pursuit of wholeness. I want to be running toward the light, not just away from the darkness. I want to know Christ in His perfection and let that relationship be the motivation for everything else I do.

Jesus, keep my eyes fixed on you and not on the raging seas around me.