What is Your Ultimate Beauty?
Dear Champions,The short excerpt is by Tim Keller, and the Scripture is 1 John 4:10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
When I was in college I had a music appreciation course, and I had to listen to Mozart so I could pass the test. I had to pass the test so that I could get a good grade on the course, so I could get a degree. I had to get a good degree so that I could get into a good grad school, and I had to get into a good grad school so that I could get a white-collar job. I used Mozart to get money.
Something has happened to Mozart and me over the years, and now I use money to get Mozart. Why do I do it, and what does Mozart give me? Mozart just gives me Mozart.
When you find something beautiful; then it is its own reward, and you look at it or have it or listen to it or you are with it just for what it is. If, on the other hand, you listen to it or look at it or have it in order to get something else, then you are not doing it for itself.
Some people obey God in order to get something that they find beautiful. However, when you recognize that you are a sinner saved by grace you begin to find that you love God for who He is, and you obey Him not for what He has given you. As a result your obedience becomes personal and absolutely unconditional. If you have a condition on your obedience, if you say, If God does not answer that prayer, then what good is being a Christian? Then what you are saying is that God is not really the thing that you need. God is not your ultimate beauty; and He is not the thing that your heart is really after.
What makes you a Christian or not a Christian is not so much whether you are obeying the will of God, but why are you obeying the will of God.
Champions, have a great week!-David Vining
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