Category: Motivation (Page 3 of 3)

Remember the Lord

August 31, 2022 / BroClo-Blogger-2022 / 0 Comments

Whenever Christians around the world take the Lord’s Supper, they’re honoring Jesus’ instructions, “Do this in remembrance of Me” (Luke 22.19). In this feast we consciously remember that Jesus gave body and blood for us. However, remembering the Lord and his death should be a daily habit, not just an occasional one.

Paul, writing to Timothy to encourage him in his labors, said, “Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, descendant of David, according to my gospel…” (2 Timothy 2.8). That wasn’t a reference to communion; it was a reminder of the power of Jesus’ death and resurrection to shape Timothy’s life and ministry.

Clement of Alexandria (an early Christian apologist, AD 150-215) said that the apostle Peter and his wife were executed by Nero on the same day. She was executed first, and as she was being led away, Peter called out her name and encouraged her, saying, “Remember the Lord” (Stromata, VII.11).

How different would your day be if you remembered the Lord in each and every moment?

Remember the Lord when someone insults you.
Remember the Lord when someone ignores you.
Remember the Lord when someone angers you.
Remember the Lord when someone assails a family member.
Remember the Lord when you’re sick.
Remember the Lord when you’re struggling at work or school.
Remember the Lord when you’re in the middle of a severe temptation.
Remember the Lord when things are going well.
Remember the Lord when you are blessed.

In other words, remember the Lord always.

What a powerful weapon we’ve been given! The mere memory of Christ Jesus can encourage us, strengthen us, help us, and protect us.

All we have to do is remember the Lord.

Planning

August 31, 2022 / BroClo-Blogger-2022 / 0 Comments

Author Jim Rohn said, “I find it fascinating that most people plan their vacation with better care than they do their lives. Perhaps that is because escape is easier than change.”

I’m second to none in my zeal for vacations. When my wife and I take trips, we make plans. We consider the destination, the mode of travel, the route, the accommodations, the meals, the activities, the budget, the weather, and the souvenirs. All those things are elements of a successful trip, and they deserve at least a little bit of consideration before leaving.

But after vacation comes the return to normalcy and the resumption of ordinary life. What are your plans for your life?

Growing up I heard a lot of preachers say, “Heaven is a prepared place for a prepared people.” That sentiment is based on Jesus’ statement in John 14.1-3: “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.” (ESV)

There’s a lot about that text I don’t understand. Jesus doesn’t tell us what preparations he’s making. He doesn’t describe the rooms or dwelling places we’ll inhabit. He doesn’t tell us exactly when he’s returning to gather us. But I do understand that he hasn’t forgotten about his followers, and that being in the Father’s house eternally will be a special thing.

But there’s an important implication. If Jesus is preparing a place for us to stay, what plans are we making to be with him? We don’t take vacations without making plans and decisions beforehand. Do we honestly think that the most important destination of all deserves any less?

We prepare for things we think are important. If heaven isn’t at the top of our list, we need a reassessment of what’s important. The most important thing of all is our spiritual wellbeing. Jesus said, “For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?” (Matthew 16.26, NASB)

The point is simple: We’re all preparing right now for our eternal dwelling place. The question is whether we’re preparing to be with Jesus in our Father’s house.

Lowering the Goal

August 3, 2022 / BroClo-Blogger-2022 / 1 Comment

You may find this hard to believe, but when I was in ninth grade, I could dunk a basketball. One-handed, two-handed, tomahawk, gorilla – you name it I could do it.

You see, my friend Monty had a basketball goal in his back yard with a rim that was six feet off the ground. That’s right, six feet. I could dunk the ball standing flat footed. It made for a lot of fun and was enormously ego-building.

The problem was that on a real basketball court I wasn’t an especially good player. With my astounding twelve-inch vertical leap, I could barely touch the bottom of the backboard. Against real competition, with real equipment, real referees, and real rules, I couldn’t dunk. I stunk. Lowering the goal didn’t help me play better basketball, and in many ways, it probably made me an even worse player.

Goals exist for a reason. Whether in basketball, life, career, or relationships, goals represent a standard or an ideal. They represent something we strive to attain, something that stretches us, challenges us, and promotes growth. Whenever we “lower the goal” we’re simply cheating ourselves out of reaching our potential.

Christians are challenged to, in the words of Oswald Chambers, to give “their utmost for his highest.” Jesus said it best: “Therefore you are to be perfect, even as your heavenly father is perfect” (Matthew 5.48). You can’t set the rim any higher.

When we read passages like that, we shake our heads and think, “Surely Jesus didn’t mean that.” But God the Father says, “Thus you shall be holy, for I am holy” (Leviticus 11.45b). God doesn’t lower the goal.

What all of this means is that God himself is the standard of what he expects his people to be. Our holiness must resemble his holiness. Our righteousness must resemble his righteousness. Our love must resemble his love. Our forgiveness must resemble his forgiveness. Our mercy must resemble his mercy.

Whenever we lower the goal, we flip the script. We become the standard, not God. We think that by lowering the goal it makes the standard more attainable. What it really does is make the standard less meaningful and less desirable. Holiness mixed with sin isn’t holiness. Love tainted by hate isn’t love. Forgiveness mingled with resentment and bitterness isn’t forgiveness. Mercy shaded with prejudice isn’t mercy.

Ultimately, lowering the goal is simply a form of idolatry, a way of putting something ahead of God. We don’t need any more idols in this world. We need the clear, unchanging, and lofty standards that reflect the holiness of God himself.

Why Believing in Yourself Is a Bad Idea

June 29, 2022 / BroClo-Blogger-2022 / 0 Comments

The Gospel of John records a long conversation between Jesus and his apostles on the night he was betrayed. The content of John chapters 14-17 began in the upper room where they celebrated the Last Supper and continued all the way to the Garden of Gethsemane. It was a hard conversation about how they should prepare for his death and departure.

The conversation began with this admonition: “Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in me” (John 14.1). He said that no matter what happened, trust God.

If Jesus had said this in the 21^st century, and if he were a motivational speaker, or successful blogger, or life coach, or talk show host, he might have said something like this:

“Let not your heart be troubled, believe in yourself.”
“Let not your heart be troubled, because you’re a winner.”
“Let not your heart be troubled, you’ve got this!”
“Let not your heart be troubled, look within for the answers.”
“Let not your heart be troubled, you’re awesome!”

But then, Jesus wasn’t a life coach, he was God’s Only Begotten Son. He wasn’t interested in their self-esteem, but their spiritual transformation.

The Bible never says to believe in ourselves. In fact, it assumes we already have a certain degree of self-love programmed into us by our Creator. When Jesus said to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 19.19), he was saying that we should love our neighbors in the same way and to the same degree as we do ourselves. He wasn’t promoting self-love, he was assuming it.

The apostle Paul said, “Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others” (Philippians 2.3-4). In other words, loving others demands that we love them as much as we love ourselves.

The apostle Paul also warned too much self-love. He said, “For through the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgment” (Romans 12.3). Too much self-love causes too much ego.

This isn’t to say that self-esteem and self-respect and self-love are unimportant. What it does say is that what we think of Christ is far more important than what we think of ourselves.

So, when you’re struggling and troubled and hurting, what do you do? You do what Jesus said: “Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in me” (John 14.1).

Of Bricks & Cathedrals

May 11, 2022 / BroClo-Blogger-2022 / 0 Comments

Two masons were working hard building a wall. A stranger stopped and asked, “What are you doing?”

One of the men glared at him with a scowl and snarled, “I’m laying bricks! What do you think?”

The other man smiled at him with a gleam in his eyes and said, “I’m building a cathedral!”

The difference between the two men wasn’t what they were doing, but how they perceived what they were doing. One man had vision, while the other didn’t. The same thing applies us. It’s the difference between going through the motions and using imagination in our work. It’s the difference between the ordinary and the extraordinary.

Biblically, it’s the difference between Simon and Peter. In John chapter one, Andrew introduced his brother Simon to Jesus. We’re told (John 1.42), “Jesus looked at him and said, ‘You are Simon the son of John; you shall be called Cephas’ (which is translated Peter).” The name Peter was the Greek word petros, which meant a rock. In the gospels, Peter is anything but a rock: he’s rash, brash, boastful, cocky, and foolish, and at the end of the gospels, he publicly denies Jesus three times. But John also records that Jesus restored him in the end (John 21). So, when we get to the book of Acts, Peter (the Rock) becomes a source of strength and encouragement to his fellow apostles and fellow Christians in the early days of the church. Jesus had vision – he saw Simon for what he could become.

This kind of vision transforms everything we do. Typing an email becomes an act of communication. Staring at a spreadsheet becomes strategic business planning. Pulling weeds becomes landscaping. Laying tile becomes interior design.

It also transforms our lives as Christians. Planning your monthly budget becomes stewardship. Sunday church attendance becomes worship. Studying your Bible becomes a spiritual feast. Socializing with other Christians becomes fellowship. Visiting the sick becomes serving the body of Christ.

Whatever your job, and however mundane you may think it is, apply imagination, perspective, and vision, and you’ll completely transform your attitude about your work.

Are you laying bricks or building cathedrals? The choice is yours.

The Fundamentals of Success

May 4, 2022 / BroClo-Blogger-2022 / 0 Comments

“Success is neither magical nor mysterious. Success is the natural consequence of consistently applying the basic fundamentals.” – Jim Rohn

I’m not an expert on motivation, or success, or self-help. Although I’ve read books about success and motivation, I’ve never completely mastered any of them, and in some areas, I’m still not very good. But I’ve studied it enough to know that the principles of success aren’t mysterious, but, in fact, are reasonably obvious. My problem isn’t knowledge, it’s application. Or more accurately, lack of application.

Now, think of this in terms of your spiritual life. I’ll reword this quotation by substituting the word “spirituality” in place of the word “success.” It would then say, “Spirituality is neither magical nor mysterious. Spirituality is the natural consequence of consistently applying the basic fundamentals.” I find it helpful to think of spiritual growth in that way: applying a set of fundamental principles to the problems we face in our spiritual lives.

By way of application, which of these two components do you struggle with the most? Is it with learning fundamental spiritual principles? Or is it with putting the principles into practice?

This is where the discipline of self-examination becomes so critically important. Every day of every week, each of us needs to take a hard and honest look at ourselves to see where we should improve. The only way we can improve is to identify the problem, find the biblical principle that addresses the problem, and then put the principle into practice to eliminate the problem. That’s spiritual success.

As we said at the beginning, there’s nothing magical or mysterious about spiritual success. It’s a matter of applying the principles to the problem.

Jesus said it best of all: “If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them” (John 13.17).

When Firing Isn’t An Option

March 8, 2022 / BroClo-Blogger-2022 / 0 Comments

Lou Holtz once said, “Motivation is simple. You eliminate those who are not motivated.”

I suppose that for someone in a position of power or authority that is one possible solution to motivation. The head coach can always bench an unmotivated player, or increase his level of motivation with extra conditioning, or cut him from the team. The boss in the workplace can also fire an unproductive worker, or assign him to “the job that nobody wants.” I would think that sometimes this is the best way to motivate someone else.

But not always.

There are three problems with this approach. First, you can’t always get rid of problematic people. Anyone who has ever coached a team knows that sometimes the lazy athlete may also be more popular than the coach. The athlete may be protected by a prideful administrator or by irate parents. The boss may not be able to fire someone because of contract issues, union protection, or simply because he can’t afford to go out and find better workers.

Second, there are often better ways of motivating others: Being patient with someone; showing someone a better way; offering further training or opportunities; making the workplace more internally competitive. All of these things might prove to be better motivators than the threat of being banished to a deserted island.

Third, this approach overlooks the fact that some of the greatest triumphs in life come out of situations that we cannot change. There are many circumstances in life that we cannot control. I may not be able to control my coworkers’ attitudes, but I can change mine. I may not be able to change the work that someone else does, but I may find a better way to do mine. And, when all else fails, I could learn to be content. Yikes!

The apostle Paul demonstrates this kind of thinking in his letter to the church in Philippi. At the time he wrote, he was imprisoned in Rome for the impolitic act of preaching the good news about Jesus of Nazareth. Some of Paul’s fellow preachers took advantage of his imprisonment and hoped that it would cause him distress. They apparently thought that since he was in jail this would create an opportunity for their own prominence. They thought they could gain some sort of competitive advantage with Paul out of the picture. They thought this would show him that Brother Paul wasn’t the only preacher in town.

Paul’s response? “Some, to be sure, are preaching Christ even from envy and strife, but some also from good will; the latter do it out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the gospel; the former proclaim Christ out of selfish ambition rather than from pure motives, thinking to cause me distress in my imprisonment. What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed; and in this I rejoice” (Philippians 1.15-18).

Paul couldn’t control his circumstances. He couldn’t control their circumstances. He couldn’t change their motives or their actions. Nor could he fire them. So, he found the good in what they did, even if their motives were corrupt.

Maybe you can’t change someone else’s motivation, but you can certainly change your own. Maybe you can’t change your circumstances, but you can certainly change your attitude about them. Maybe you can’t get rid of your problems, but you can choose to thrive anyway.

And that’s worth celebrating!

Why Did You Start?

March 8, 2022 / BroClo-Blogger-2022 / 0 Comments

“Think about why you started.”

I saw this quote today attributed to that ubiquitous and prolific author, “Unknown”. It’s not bad advice if you’re thinking about quitting.

Thinking about quitting your diet? Why did you begin?
Thinking about quitting your exercise regimen? Why did you start?
Thinking about quitting your job? What motivated you in the first place?
Thinking about quitting a relationship? Church? A significant life goal? Why did you ever start?

That’s not to say that we should never quit anything. Some diets probably aren’t that effective. Some exercise regimens might hurt more than they help. Some jobs were never meant to be permanent. But especially with significant things in life, the question should at least be asked.

I would also suggest it’s good motivation for Christians. To me, it nicely encapsulates the message of the book of Hebrews. The book was apparently written to Jewish Christians who were struggling with their faith in Christ. They had been Christians long enough to know the fundamentals (Hebrews 5.11-14). They already had demonstrated good works and commitment (6.9-12), and had already been through some stout persecution (10.32-39).

As they looked back at the familiar and comfortable ways of Judaism, the writer also urges them to look back as well. First he simply reminds them of the greatness of Christ. By giving up on their allegiance to Jesus, they were giving up something that could not be replaced. Jesus was God’s last word to mankind (1.1ff). He was greater than the angels themselves (chapter 1), greater than Moses (chapter 3), Joshua (chapter 4), and Aaron (chapter 5). His ministry, tabernacle, priesthood, sacrifices, and covenant were without rival (chapters 7-10). As they looked back to Jesus and to his greatness, it should evoke powerful memories of why they followed him in the first place.

Then, near the end of the book, he also asks them to look back upon their experiences. At 10.32ff, he asks them to “remember the former days”. He doesn’t ask them to think only of the good times, but in a move that would shock any self-respecting life coach, he asks them to remember their suffering. It was in that suffering, and in their response to it, that the depth of their commitment could be clearly seen. In that suffering they experienced joy and hope (10.34).

At 13.3, he tells them to remember their fellow prisoners. Those with whom they had suffered; those who were still suffering. It’s hard to turn your back on people you love. It’s hard to ignore those with whom you have the most in common.

Finally, at 13.7, he says to remember their leaders, those who taught them the gospel. Most of us came to Christ through the influence of someone significant. We should never forget them.

Whenever you’re struggling in your faith, look backward and ask, “Why did I start?” It should help cure you of the desire to stop.

For today, look backward.