Purpose part 2
Your EPIC destiny, your Eternal Purpose In Christ, is to be loved by God and to love Him back by loving people. That's as simple as a I can make it. That's why you were created. The God who is love created you in order to express Himself--His love--to you, and in you, and through you, and as you. So our purpose is two-fold: We must first receive God's love, because you can't give what you don't have. And we must release God's love, because love is giving. But in this Rant series I want to focus on some other aspects. Like yesterday we looked at how all things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose. How when we are walking in love, we can let things play out. We can see the bigger picture. We don't have to attack eveybody and everything. We can live and let live. Support people no matter what. And I don't mean enable people. I mean be there for them even if we don't agree with everything they say or do. God doesn't want robots. And we shouldn't either. We should celebrate the differences in ourselves and each other. Variety is the spice of life. Today I want to talk about purposing to live in our purpose. Colossians 3:2 (one of my favorite verses), "Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth." And the key word, to me, is set. Now in that memory verse, it is the whole phrase "set your affection on" that is defined in Strong's Greek Concordance. It is number 5426 and it means, "to exercise the mind, that is, entertain or have a sentiment or opinion; by implication to be (mentally) disposed (more or less earnestly in a certain direction); intensively to interest oneself in (with concern or obedience)." Wow. That's a lot. But basically it means "Focus on." It means choose what's important to you. Set your affection. Be purposeful in what you do. Be purposeful in what you allow into your mind, or your heart. Let the mind of Christ (that's already in you) be in you. And use that mind of Christ! God knows the thoughts that He thinks towards you--thoughts of peace and not evil to give you an expected end--so we need to know the thoughts that we think towards each other. We need to... I always say it like this, "You don't have to believe everything you think." And rather than using a verse like 2 Corinthians 10:5, "Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ," as an excuse to go thought chasing... I think we should just let things go. If we have a "bad" thought... just let it go. Just focus on the things we ought to be focusing on. Purpose to make the important things important. Don't let things that don't matter wear you out. Don't give power to things that don't have any power. Love is all-powerful. Which doesn't mean MOST powerful. It means nothing but love has any power. So don't give things power that don't have any power. SET your affection. Live with a purpose. Our purpose is to be loved and to love each other with that love. That's what matters. That's what important. That's our purpose, and that's how we live on purpose, by purpose, and for purpose!