Too Busy for God
God calls
every person to seek him. It is an intimate call that we as humans can neglect,
misunderstand, ignore, or just plain reject. But people will always realize
that there is emptiness in them. They want something to fill this emptiness and
they busy themselves to find that fulfillment. But unlike Job – They don’t
realize its God that’s missing.
Even people
who say they believe can have emptiness. People try to fill that emptiness by
looking at themselves and what they control. In the search to fill that
emptiness they become too busy for God; ask them. The problem becomes that they
are looking at the world and the works of men to fill that emptiness. They
don’t look to God.
Their
motivation is external motivation. They find their God in the applause from
others, success, recognition, or
praise. When they don’t get that
praise and honor they feel they deserve, they are discouraged
This was not
on Jesus’ agenda. He was not after praise. That is not why Jesus was here. So
many places in the gospel Jesus “would not allow them to speak” of what he had
done.
Jesus was
busy. His busyness was driven by a different motivation that what drives most
people. He was doing the work of the Father. The Gospel tells us about Jesus.
He started the day in the synagogue, healed Simon Peter’s Mother, and then the
whole town came bringing those who were ill and possessed by demons. And, he
preached.
Despite his
busyness, Jesus always found quality me-time to spend with God. “In the morning, long before dawn, he
got up and left the house, and went off to a deserted place and prayed.”
Then he was off to the synagogues to preach and to heal.
Paul was busy
preaching. He didn’t preach for fame, success, or applause. He
preached because he had too. He preached to share in the Gospel. He preached to
fill that emptiness with God. He shared his preaching and his prayer for that
me-time with God.
My brothers
and sisters you preach by the life you live; but what do you preach. If we are
too busy for God and only worried about success, applause and recognition,
those are the gods that you truly preach.
Let me tell
you about another young preacher. Grant was a baseball player. Twenty-three
years old and in the Oakland A’s minor farm league, Grant hit 31 home runs in
his first minor league season and another 11 in fall league. He won the Most
Valuable Player award in November 2009. He was the talk of the league and as a
second round draft choice had signed $430,000 contract. The next year instead
of returning to baseball, he gave up fame, applause, and the success of
professional sports career to become a priest.
Each of us
looks for success. We have family; we have school or work; we have friends and
we want success for all of them. For true success, we need Christ. All the
success of earth is temporary, for eternal success we need God. We start this
true success in that me-time with God, found in prayer.
Prayer brings
us true success as we re-energize our faith. We see the fruits of our work,
purify our intentions, and remind ourselves why we do what we do, when we bring
them all to God.
That me-time
with God allows us to recognize the true motivator. In that me-time we are
looking for Him. It is prayer where we fill the emptiness inside us and
recognize the glory of God. Then we can truly preach.
Jesus
preached. Paul preached. We are each given the ministry to preach the Gospel.
Preach to our family and the people around us. We preach with our lives when
what we do is for the glory of God. We
preach when we allow Christ, the word of God to flow in us! We preach in
through our lives when we engage with others and God!
Success is
filling that emptiness that exists in us. Success is found in what motivates us
to fill that emptiness. True success is finding the higher motivation than
anything on this earth. True success is found when we pray and realize the
glory of God. Then everything else falls in place.
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