More Motivation

by Aaron
Look, I know we live in California and everyone likes to mock us when we complain about it being cold…but just because they live in a place that nothing can survive without human ingenuity doesn’t make my plight less severe when the temperature drops into the 30s. I was thinking about this the other day when looking in my backyard covered with bone chilling frost (the back yard was covered with frost, not me). In my own little way I call this “snow” because it’s the only other season I get.
 
It seems to me, over the last couple of years, we didn’t get a winter, just variations of summer. Now that winter is actually here, at least our version of it, I find myself feeling like it isn’t enough. I want colder, I want more rain, I want more clouds and bundled up snuggling with my wife as we binge watch some stupid TV show.
 
I think I always want more.
 
But not more in a good way.
 
Like the last blog I wrote (PWS) about my package withdrawal syndrome, I find myself in a kind of funk after the holidays this year. I keep trying to “get into” things or hope something different would happen that would motivate me to feel like life is kicking me into gear again. This is really what the problem is, what do we do when we feel like we don’t have motivation.
 
This is why I believe that the Gospel (the good news of what Jesus did and continues to do) is so important. The Gospel reminds us that our motivation is simply a response to what God has already done. I think it is why Paul says, So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” (1 Cor 10:31) Or, “And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.” (Col 3:17)
 
When Paul says these words, he isn’t talking about working hard so God loves us, he is talking about loving God in all we do as the motivation for what we do. Rather than waiting to be inspired, we need to remember what Jesus has done and that should inspire us. When wondering, “what should me out of bed” or “off the couch” any given day, we should remember that the glory of God is what motivated God to save and rescue us. If God’s own glory motivated redemption, how much more should it motivate us to live lives that honor His name?
 
I am not saying that snuggling with my wife can’t be glorifying to God, I believe it can, but waiting to be inspired to do something worthwhile is missing the point. All inspiration for life and godliness sits directly in front of us, for us to ignore it is folly.