One thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I seek: 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 seek him in his temple. Psalms 27:4
I listened to a sermon recently on Psalm 27. In describing David’s hunger for God, the pastor called him ‘a man who specialized in knowing God’. His description of David struck a nerve in me. For 2 reasons:
#1: I’m still looking for my ‘niche’. So I can focus on ‘one thing’ I’m good at. I’m tired of trying to do it all. #2: The reminder of David’s ‘one thing’ made me re-examine this obsession with finding my ‘sweet spot’. It also reminded me of a younger me. For I once shared David’s passion. Psalms 27:4 was my ‘life verse’.
My hunger to know God has gradually been replaced by a hunger to be known.
His desire for God exposed my recent lack of desire. David’s ‘one thing’? To know God and be with God. That desire is what marked him. If honest, the desire that marks me lately is the desire to ‘make a mark’. Before this sermon, I hadn’t thought about knowing God for quite a while. Too focused on ‘being known’.
It’s not that I don’t want to know God. I’ve just assumed I already do. So I’m on to other things now. Like making an impact. Living for Him. Sounds good, except I can live for God yet not really live with Him. It's not like He's missing. But my awareness of Him is. It happens in marriages. It can happen with God.
Everything is made to center upon the initial act of “accepting” Christ, and we are not expected thereafter to crave any further revelation of God to our spirit. We have been snared in the coils of a false logic which insists that if we have found Him, we need no more seek Him.” A.W. Tozer From ‘The Pursuit of God’
God showed Himself to Moses, yet he cried ‘Show me your glory’. David knew God, yet wanted to know Him better. I once had that desire - to know God. But after years of serving God with little to show for it, I find I want to be known. To be good at something. As if it’ll prove my worth and justify my existence.
Even as I write that, I know better. I've held on to assumptions that may not be true at all. Like thinking the measure of my worth is measured by what others say of me. Why do I need public vindication before I'll believe that my life counts for something? Do I need a great resume to prove I’m good enough to a ‘hard to please’ Dad? Do I think the only viable reward for secret obedience is public honor? Is that the only reward that 'counts'?
My head knows better. So why is my heart still so obsessed with specializing and being good at something? Maybe it’s because I’m still not sure if I’m really ‘good’ at anything. And at my age that’s hard to swallow. It doesn't help that I measure my life by how big my impact is instead of how faithful I am to God’s call.
There is nothing wrong with wanting to specialize. To focus on what you’re good at. But what determines just how good you can become in any field is not the level of your talent. It’s the motive of your heart.
The true specialist doesn’t do what he does for the praise or rewards. He could care less if he’s viewed as a specialist. He loves art for its own sake. He plays for the love of the game. Win or lose. His aim is to get better at what he does. It’s why he can focus for weeks on a project yet never lose sleep over mistakes. Each mistake is a chance to learn and improve his craft. He does what he does because he loves it. Public success is secondary.
A good artist doesn’t see his finished work as the measure of his worth. He gets his sense of worth elsewhere. If his worth doesn’t depend on pleasing others or being perfect, he won’t fear failure. He'll use it to get better. If he has a sense of worth apart from reviews, he won’t lose his joy or incentive over not being the best.
I know my worth is found in God’s view of me, not yours. So why do I focus on proving my worth to others? Knowing that the time I have left shrinks each year, this desire to ‘make a mark’ is on my mind a lot more.
After God used this pastor to remind me of David’s obsession, I remembered the days when I too had no other interest than God Himself. I just wanted to know Him. And the more I learned of Him, the more my hunger grew. It's a lot like falling in love. Where you become indifferent to everything else in life because your heart is so consumed with the one you love. Being with them. Knowing them. Loving them.
But as many couples know, it’s easy for distractions to pull our focus elsewhere. And what captures my attention can easily capture my heart. Until my marriage is just another plate to keep spinning. Soon, I’m so focused on balancing all the roles in my life, that I lose sight of what matters. Loving God and the people He put in my life.
God hasn’t called me to balance life well, but to love well. See The sweet gift of your total attention. If I focus on all that I’m doing for you and how well I’m doing it, I can miss you. The one I’m doing it for.
Imagine a bride who’s so distracted on her wedding day, that she not only forgets her wedding dress. She forgets her groom. That’s exactly what God imagined once as He considered the fickle love of His people. ‘Does a bride forget her wedding dress, yet my people have forgotten me days without number.’ Jer. 2:32
Just as I can forget God in my busyness or in chasing distractions, I can also forget God in my pursuit of ‘finding my niche’ or ‘making my mark’. It matters that I bear fruit and steward a gift, but if my motive in serving is to finally feel a sense of worth, I’ve missed the point of the Gospel and the point in having ministry gifts.
As for spiritual gifts, they’re given for the sake of others. Not for our self esteem. As for finding worth, we are unworthy in the sense of being deserving, but we DO have worth. Our worth is measured by the price God paid to have us. My worth is not measured by what I do or the impact I make. But by what God thinks I'm worth.
My worth is not even measured by the kind of person I become while I live on this earth. Yes, I want to be like Jesus. And it’s what God wants. But He considered me worth the price of His Son when I was at my worst. A dirty crumpled up masterpiece is still a masterpiece and still worth a lot to the expert who knows it's value.
It’s a huge relief to know my worth is not found in what I do for God or how I contribute to His kingdom. Yet at the same time, I must admit this news really messes with my motivation. I’m so used to doing stuff to either win approval, impress people or to gain entrance into the inner circle so I can feel like I belong.
And then I discover that God loves me as I am and accepts me as I am. So I no longer need to prove my worth. I do believe that with all my heart. So why do I still feel this need to find my niche and be good at something? Maybe this longing isn’t totally corrupt. It can be if it’s driven by insecurity and the need to prove myself. But like other desires, it’s not evil in itself. The desire to excel in what you’re good at is a gift from God.
Eric Liddell earned the right to represent Great Britain in the 1924 Olympics in Paris. His best event, and the one everyone assumed he'd win easily, was the 100-meter sprint. However, the qualifying heat for his race was on a Sunday—a day he regarded as the Sabbath. Disappointed, yet bound by his faith, he made the hard decision not to run, even though his victory would have made him a huge national hero.
His aim was to please God and being secure enough in who he was, he could give up his chance for glory. Many saw it as a waste of talent. But he didn’t. He wasn’t running for a medal or applause. He intended to go to China as a missionary. So his sister questioned his decision to run in the Olympics. He told her, “I believe God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure.”
He ran for one reason. He liked to. And he was good at it. And when he did, he felt ‘God’s pleasure’. In contrast, for Eric's #1 competitor Harold Abrahams, running wasn’t about pleasing God. It was about proving himself good enough. He viewed the race as “ten lonely seconds to justify my whole existence.”
Harold's honest confession pierced my soul. His words served as a mirror in which i saw my own heart. I don’t want to live with that mindset anymore! Nor does God want me to! How can I rest in His love if I'm always wondering, “Have I done enough? Am I good enough yet? Do I matter now? Do I belong?”
The problem with this drive to prove myself is that such a mindset never allows me to simply be myself. I’m so busy trying to be successful, I lose the ability to be happy, be loved, be in the moment or just be. In my obsession to be ‘good enough’, I also lose my ability to be ‘good’ at anything. Why? I can’t focus on hitting the ball if my aim is to impress fans. I can’t make a masterpiece if my real goal is to make a name.
You’ll never truly specialize in any art as long as you’re doing it for any other motive than the art itself. If your happiness in making movies is tied up in box office stats, you’ll never make a movie worth seeing. The artist David Bowie said “I didn’t strive for success. I tried to do something artistically important’.
To ‘specialize’ in a field is to focus all your effort and time in mastering one particular aspect of that field. The motive is crucial. There’s a big difference between a scientist who wants to find a cure and one who wants to be known for finding a cure. And there’s a big difference between a man who wants to know God deeply and one who wants to be known for knowing God deeply. God can tell the difference. Can I?
While at a pastors conference, Andy Stanley addressed a need all of us feel: a need to be known. He said, “We all have an appetite to be known as someone special. But this appetite will never be fully satisfied. The more you're ‘known’, the more you want to be ‘known’. We all have a little bit of ‘Lady Gaga’ in us."
As leaders, we can’t escape being known. God often puts leaders in the spotlight. “That day the Lord exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel; and they stood in awe of him all the days of his life, just as they had stood in awe of Moses.” Josh 4:14 If men’s praises are addictive, how do leaders deal with fame?
Andy said that if God puts me on a platform where I'm known, I'm to use that status for Him, to leverage my gifts and my calling for His glory, not for the pursuit of applause. He suggested following the example of John the Baptist. When his followers told him that many were now following Jesus instead of John, he said “He must increase. I must decrease. This is all about Him, not me! My role is to point you to Him.”
And that's the point of God revealing Himself to us. So we can know Him deeply and make Him known. But many are no longer pulled by a desire to know God. They want to be known as men who know God.
Like a man in love, those who want to know God don't care if they're known for it. They just want God! When Moses was caught up with God's beauty, his face began to glow. And the people noticed. But he didn’t. He was caught up in God Himself and being with Him. Not in how it made him look. If honest, I’d likely be more focused on how to ‘keep the glow’. Because I’m far too focused on how people see me.
But the glory on His face was there because of who He was looking at. Not because of anything in him. To shift my focus on me is as ridiculous as standing in the throne room and looking at myself in a mirror. I thought of this metaphor because I once dreamed it. And the meaning was clear. Get your eyes off you. Easier said than done. The craving for affirmation is addictive. It's why we take selfies at a scenic vista.
This tourist took 2 pics at this scenic overlook. One of himself and one of his camera. And it’s what I do when I focus on how I look instead of what I’m looking at. Or on how I’m seen instead of what I see. In the same way, our preoccupation with being known is often what keeps us from knowing God or others.
Andy Stanley said, “If God let's you ‘be known’ for a time, it's not about you, nor is it for your sake or your glory. It's from God and for His glory. God lets us be known so that we can make Him known. We must pursue our gifts and produce our best work, but not for ourselves and our applause addictions."
If God gives you a gift of being known, it’s so that you can make Him known. Be a good steward of that gift. Don’t lose sight of who it’s from and who it’s for. Andy Stanley
This quote hits home in a personal way. I haven’t posted regularly on this blog for 5 years. Why? To be honest, with so few readers, I felt no incentive. I thought “Why write if no one reads it?” I forgot 'who it's from and who it's for'. Actually, a few people have read it and if God used it to help one person, to Him it's worth it. Is it to me?
One of those readers emailed me last week to tell me that my posts have helped her in recent years. She said “God will use your writing even when you don’t realize it!” How true! Knowing that makes me want to write!
When I started this blog, I had 2 goals. #1. Grow in my walk with God and learn how to stay focused on Jesus. (I learn best as I write.) #2. And to hopefully help others do the same. I told God, “I trust you to send it where it’s needed.” I told myself “If it helps one reader, it’s worth it. And if that one reader is me, it’s still worth it.”
But after my 65th birthday, this fear of obscurity settled in. Then a pandemic forced me into an unplanned ‘semi-retirement’. Feeling invisible with little fruit to show for 40 years of pastoring, I became discouraged. I felt like a racehorse put out to pasture. Initially I focused on writing, but when I saw how few read my blog, I stopped writing. My focus had shifted to the impact of my writing (or lack thereof) instead of why I write.
I didn't start writing to gain an audience. I asked God to show me His heart and mine. As He did I needed words for it. Finding words helps me learn. It's why I love to write. God opens my eyes as I do and I feel close to Him. Allen Arnold said,"God’s desire is not that we write about him or even for Him. He wants us to write with Him." Yes, I want to help others, but as Elie Wiesel said, 'I write to understand as well as to be understood.'
But the fear of obscurity and the desire for people’s approval gradually corrupted my motive for writing. Instead of writing for the reasons I love to write, I started writing in hopes of being noticed as a writer worthy of notice.
Never play to the gallery. Never work for other people in what you do. Always remember that the reason you initially started working was there was something inside yourself that, if you could manifest it, you felt you would understand more about yourself. I think it’s terribly dangerous for an artist to fulfill other people’s expectations. David Bowie
Why I do what I do affects my ability to enjoy what I do. I once wrote because I learn by writing and I want to help others. Once I started 'playing to the gallery', to get likes or gain readers, I lost the joy of writing. But that reader's email rekindled the fire. I remembered my 'why'. I want to write with God and for those who need what He's teaching me. I prayed Isa. 49:2 for years. 'Like an arrow, send me where you need me.' And He did! Makes me want to write more! Not just so He'll use me. But I also want to know God better and writing helps me do so.
I see now that my part is to write what I learn and post what I write. God can be trusted to use it how He sees fit. The joy is back! This thing of ‘doing your thing’ can be a lot of fun when life isn’t about you or proving yourself.
Don Miller in his opening to 'Blue like Jazz' said "I never liked jazz music because jazz music doesn't resolve. But I was outside the Bagdad Theater in Portland one night when I saw a man playing the saxophone. I stood there for fifteen minutes, and he never opened his eyes. After that, I liked Jazz Music. Sometimes you have to watch somebody love something before you can love it yourself."
That's how I feel about knowing God. Watching David who had all a man could ever want, want God above it all makes me not want to settle for lesser desires. Like being 'known'. What a cheap trinket compared to the thrill of knowing Him! The more I see of His heart and the closer I get to Him, I realize that life's greatest joy is found in God Himself. Not in His gifts, but in Him. Not in being known but in knowing Him. Nothing else will satisfy.
The enjoyment of God is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. Jonathan Edwards
