Thursday 13 June 2013

Life - What It's All About


We were created for a purpose. There is a reason you are on the planet. It is no accident that you are who you are, where you are, and why you are the way you are. There are two great and humanly invinceable forces at work in your life. You don't have to be religious to experience these forces. Actually, you can't not experience them. The first and greatest is a force in your soul like that of a compass needle which always points north - but in your soul's case gravitates to True North. The second force is miniscule by comparison. But even a tiny magnet can, when brought close to the compass, distort the needle's rotation. Yet most people have had their souls distorted so that their soul's compass needle is no longer pointing 'True North'. Let me explain...

I'm surprised that people are surprised when they discover that most highly successful and driven people are empty and directionless. One of the main reasons highly successful people become highly successful people is because are inwardly so unsuccessful. They are empty. They are dry. They are frustrated. They are in pain. They often loathe themselves.Yet outwardly, they have adoring fans, nice toys, investments, and famous 'friends'. They are afflicted with a series of tiny magnets that have distorted their soul's compass. These tiny magnets involuntarily veers their soul's compass needle away from 'North' to 'South'. Despite the compass needle doing all it can, and despite the massive magnetic pull of True North, the tiny magnet's proximity to the compass steers the soul's ship away from its Northerly homeward bound journey.

You've probably met South-bound people. They hold back. Their lack of transparency is a clue that something has magnetically spun their compass out of whack. If you could hear their heart you would hear ache. Who am I? What am I doing? Why doesn't anyone really care about me? Where am I going in life? These are pained questions. These are the questions that a malfunctioning compass causes when it sends its victim 'South'.

God is our True North. Augustine wrote, "You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you." When our Enemy first entered the First Garden and began to spread his magnetic lies, our representative (Adam) should have pulled the compass of his soul away. But he didn't. He went rogue and has steadily drifted South ever since. This Southerly drift uses magnetic lies to maintain the scam. "Life is about you" ... "You deserve more" ... "Your happiness in life is your most important purpose" ... "You have a right to feel positive about who you are and whatever you chose to do" ... "You have to love yourself before you can love anyone else" - all highly magnetic (attractive) lies that distort the God-created-and-designed- inclination of our soul's compass needle to True North.

The Sunday gathering of God-lovers ("Church") is quite repulsive to our Enemy's little magnets of sin. These little magnetic South Inclining Nodes find something quite repulsive about the strong True-North-Magnetic field present in the gathering of the Redeemed. When the Church gathers it is a reminder to each member about their journey toward True North because every otherperson is a physical declaration from God that life is not about me - it's about others. Our Northerly journey is marked by continual opportunities to model God's forgiveness to others (even our North-bound brothers and sisters can offend and upset us at times). Our Lord had to head North out of Jerusalem to die for us on Calvary, but not before He demonstrated forgiveness toward those who were hurting Him. His demonstration of the Father's love should both inform and inspire our own North-bound journeys.

The journey "South" is a journey of deception. It fools its victim into thinking that the journey is about them. The journey "North" however is the journey toward Christlikeness and increased servanthood. Thus, God. our True North, calls His children to represent Him and show His love to others by serving them. The person who feels that others don't serve them - even though they feel they are serving others, is almost certainly heading 'South' even though they think they're heading 'North'.
So you too, when you have done everything you were commanded to do, should say, 'We are slaves undeserving of special praise; we have only done what was our duty.'"
Luke 17:10
What's life about? It's about walking in the ways, Word, and will of God ('North') which leads to us having the little pesky magnets of the Enemy pulled off our soul's compass. The journey 'South' is one where travel alone - because it's about me. The journey 'North' can not be travelled alone - because it's about others. In yet another counter-intuitive truth, the more we bless and others, the better we feel!
Life? What's about it? It's about being God's blessing to others.
And he said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.
This is the great and first commandment.
And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets."

Matthew 22:37-40
God has made you. You are not an accident in His eyes. No matter what you've done or who you've done it with or how many times you've done it, God loves you and wants to forgive you. He wants you to live on purpose. And this purpose is to head 'North' by increasingly coming to know Him and making Him known by being His blessing to others.

Ps. Andrew

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