What Are You Pursuing?

There are a couple of questions the Lord keeps gently bringing up lately: 

1. What is your pursuit focused on Beloved, happiness or holiness?
2. More than that, what have you lost in trading in the pursuit of holiness for happiness? 

It is a sobering, yet life-saving rebuke, drenched in His love and mercy. It’s really a question of the heart, isn’t it? Where are my affections set? What do I love most? Who do I love most?

Is it Jesus? Or is it myself and what I can gain from this world?

Here is some truth for you: God cares more about your growth and sanctification than He does about your comfort. Maybe that sounds harsh to your ears and you find yourself offended, ready to say hey but wait, God cares about me! 

He does – OH how He does! It’s BECAUSE He cares about you and loves you so deeply and fully that growth is uppermost in His plans for you. Jesus isn’t out for your happiness, that’s not His end game, and you should praise Him for that! It is so much bigger and better than that! He is after your whole heart and nothing short of transformation will do. 

What is the most loving thing? Giving us choice, right? He has set forth so many guideposts for us in Scripture on how to live and walk in relationship with Jesus, heck He has given us Himself to dwell inside us! Thanks Holy Spirit! But we still have a choice every single day, don’t we? It’s like a parent, allowing a child to make their own decisions (some decisions the parent clearly knows will lead to heartbreak and pain), but lets them make them anyway because it is the only way they can learn for themselves. He tells us to choose Him, to keep in step with Him, walking in obedience by faith, to abide in Him and trust He will do the rest.

It’s a question between life and death (Deuteronomy 30:15-20) – what will you choose?

Reflecting on my life, there have been so many times I have not chosen what is better. I have chosen death again and again. So many times I have gone after what I thought would satisfy, but the Bible tells us that anything outside of Jesus won’t work. This happens the most when I begin looking around, seeing how my life sizes up to those around me. Comparison, a tried and true tactic of the enemy, creeps in. It starts unearthing the false narratives and ingredients the world says we need for happiness. I start to take that as truth instead of what God says. The world says you have to be in a relationship and have a significant other in order to be happy – I start looking to the left and right and see that I am not as far along in the world’s script for happiness – namely settling down with a husband and starting a family. Jesus says I belong to His family and that I am indeed defined by relationship, but by relationship with Him! The world tells me I need to be fit and well-dressed to be noticed and desired. I look to the left and to the right and find that I don’t have six pack abs, I don’t own designer clothes or know that much about how to make my face perfect with makeup. Jesus says He sees me and desires me just as I am. The world tells me I have to be a quick-witted, charming, and a strong independent woman in order to get ahead in work and that getting ahead is what matters. I look to the right and to the left and find that oftentimes, I am unsure and am too loud and too opinionated and controlling. Jesus says true strength is found in dependence on Him. 

Ultimately, when I choose to pursue happiness, almost always it comes at the expense of holiness, leaving me exhausted and unsatisfied. After all my running to various idols that didn’t satisfy, who was left standing in my corner, kneeling next to me, ready with open arms? It was my Heavenly Father. Who had been walking with me each step of the way, even when I kept choosing anything and everything before Him? My Jesus. 

More often than I would like to admit, I get side-tracked by the glittering, but empty promises this world offers – financial stability, romance, the house with a dog – if I could just achieve or gain these things, then I will be happy. My life will feel complete or full, right? 

But, here’s the thing, when did Jesus ever say that happiness is the goal? 

He didn’t. 

Kingdom is the goal. “Pray then like this: ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.’” Matthew 6:9-10

“But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” Matthew 6:33

Sanctification is the goal. “For this is the will of God, your sanctification…” 1 Thess. 4:3

He is the goal. “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.” Deuteronomy 6:4-5 

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” John 10:10

Do we trust His goodness and His deep, steadfast love enough to carry the tension of all this? That’s the real question. Do you trust Him when He says He alone satisfies? Do you trust Him when He says that He will fulfill your every need? Do you trust Him when He says that this world isn’t it? That this brokenness, pain, and constant searching isn’t how He meant it to be? 

What have I lost or missed in trading the pursuit of holiness for happiness? I have been reflecting on this with Jesus and let me honestly share that I have missed opportunities for Him to reveal more of who He is, opportunities to share the Good News of my One love, my Savior with this world, relationships, and most of all and most importantly, time with Him. The great irony of it all is that I have missed Him. 

I echo what a teacher I heard recently said, “don’t hear what I’m not saying.” I am not saying Jesus doesn’t care about your desire for marriage or that how you dress can’t be a form of expressing the creativity innate in you or having dreams and going after them is a bad thing or enjoying good craft coffee is of the devil. Jesus cares about the little things, but He also cares deeply about the big things. As my pastor said recently in a sermon, “the Gospel holds the good news of a personal Savior AND a cosmic King.” He knows each of us personally and it delights Him to bring good things into our lives (James 1:17). Now this may sound silly, but as an example, He knows how much I want a female red/golden cavapoo puppy of my own. But what happens when I fixate on perceived lack? My eyes turn away from His face. We must fix our eyes on Him and His character. We must pay attention to what it is He has actually promised us and trust He is faithful to bring it to completion. AND YOU GUYS. Can I just say that He has promised us THE BEST in the Kingdom?! The God of the universe promises us HIMSELF. And He has done it! Emmanuel has come! BELIEVE Him when He says He is faithful. BELIEVE Him when He says He is good. Does His character hinge upon whether or not my desires become reality? He is still good even if I never get that puppy. He is still good even if I remain single the rest of my days. He is still good even if ministry looks nothing like I imagined. Abundant life is mine regardless! 

What is the most loving thing? Keep coming back to this question and trust He is doing that. He is love and He is faithful – He cannot deny Himself (2 Timothy 2:13). I trust that is what He is working out in my life, even when I don’t understand and even when it looks like the exact opposite. He is the one who brings life and beauty out of barrenness. He is faithful. 

“One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple.” Psalm 27:4 (but really, the whole thing)

Fix your gaze on Him, keeping Him at the center of your affections. The beauty of that is we can trust all will flow from that place (John 15; Matthew 6:33). In His goodness and graciousness, He uses our circumstances and people around us to grow us. I have heard it said jokingly, but in all seriousness, that marriage is one of the greatest means of sanctification. Friendships, co-laboring together for the sake of the Gospel in teams of people you don’t like or get along with – you don’t think the Lord will use that to grow you? Who is it you are serving at the end of the day? Is it yourself or is it Jesus? Are you focused on building your kingdom or His? 

It’s a heart check. What is driving you – what motivates you? If you’re not where you want to be, then ask! “And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us.” 1 John 5:14 Ask for Holy Spirit’s help – He is more interested in growing you and moving you forward than you are! Isn’t that a mind blowing truth?? Isn’t that a comfort? Doesn’t it speak to how much He loves you and cares for you? (Psalm 40:17)

Where have you placed your hope? Where are your affections set?

Ask Him and wrestle this out together: what is ultimately more for Your glory: my happiness and comfort or my sanctification? 

Jesus offers full forgiveness, eternal, unending joy, abundant life, and peace that passes understanding, which WILL come to full fruition when He returns. The beauty is we can experience bits of that now (John 17:3), but the reality also is that this life will be hard and it will be painful. But the hope is this: He is with you. His presence IS the promise! He is here AND we know where all this leads, Home. To Him. King Jesus will come back to make His forever home with us. To reign as King forever (God is faithful to His promises, remember? 2 Samuel 7:1-17). My job, your job, is to show up bloodied and dusty from fighting in the arena (Brene Brown analogy) trying to help as many home as we can. It is not about me. It is not about you. It is about Jesus. It’s always been about Him. 

When I look in His eyes, I know myself and I know where I belong. I want that for all people! No striving. No performance. No comparison. I don’t understand this love, but it’s what I thrive on and without it, I am utterly lost. He is the Way. He is the Truth. He is the life (John 14:6). 

So, I leave you with this question to ponder and answer honestly with Jesus: what are you pursuing?

Offer up this prayer today: what does it look like to just be your child today, Father? How can I partner with what you’re doing? Holy Spirit, keep working in me, transforming me to look more like Jesus. Help me pursue you with all I am.