Ahoy and welcome to all who would read. I hope this finds you well and provides you practical guidance and peace.
Simply put, Paul charges us to wake up and get to work. Not to just any actions, but actions in support of the intentional life He has called us to. A reality that requires us to uncomfortably define what exactly our plans are. Paul reminds us that we won't all look and act the same as we go about our lives as we have each been blessed with unique talents and abilities, with objectives peculiar to us. Let's take this moment to let the crowd continue on without us and truly think on what we aspire to accomplish so we can live an intentional life unlike anyone else.
“In light of all this, here’s what I want you to do. While I’m locked up here, a prisoner for the Master, I want you to get out there and walk—better yet, run!—on the road God called you to travel. I don’t want any of you sitting around on your hands. I don’t want anyone strolling off, down some path that goes nowhere. And mark that you do this with humility and discipline—not in fits and starts, but steadily, pouring yourselves out for each other in acts of love, alert at noticing differences and quick at mending fences.”
This week I experienced an early mid-life crisis. A close friend had a birthday and as we discussed it we realized the last ten years had raced by. As we continued he asked me a question I failed to generate an answer for: Where are you going to be ten years from now? I came home that afternoon and took stock of where my life was. I felt I had accomplished good things to this point, yet the question remained as to my ultimate intent. Restless, I worked through lists, outlined goals, and prayed that I might discover the direction of the next ten years so that I might intentionally live out my days. I recognized that absent grounded intention, my fickle whims would lead me somewhere, but there was little chance they would enable me to realize my full potential.
Paul implores us to 'run' in the direction God called us to travel, to avoid sitting on our hands, and not to waste our precious time going "down some path that leads nowhere." Such definitive and direct language. And I think it's what we all truly long for: a purposeful and fulfilled life. However, the problem is that we want so much not to waste our time that we just start going in a general direction without really lining out the route. And here is the problem: with non-specific goals/intentions we are left hoping by luck to stumble upon a narrow definition of success.
Think about it this way: instead of typing in a specific address on my phone I am looking for directions to, I know my target is generally North so I set out in that direction. What is the likelihood that I arrive at my intended location? Low, considering I have never been there before. Which is exactly the case in my life. I am trying to get to a place I have never been without specific steps, or am left following a map that needs updating. Worse yet, sometimes I 'drive' without even a specific end state in mind. I proceed along a route I see others following, obey the rules I know to follow, and hope that I wind up somewhere 'good.' It's hopeful and optimistic living, but hardly intentional. Despite its flaws, this way of living remains the pervasive pattern in society today.
So step one has to be defining our end state. Where do we want to be? What do we hope to achieve. These are such fundamental life questions that we oddly spend so little time deliberately contemplating. Why? I submit we keep them on the periphery because they are uncomfortable and force us to recognize our own mortality and failures. Even though I recognize my flawed perspective, I still struggle to let it go.
“But that doesn’t mean you should all look and speak and act the same. Out of the generosity of Christ, each of us is given his own gift.”
As I alluded to, we shouldn't all be going the same path because we aren't all designed for the same purpose. The hardest part of truly intentional living is discovering your specific course because it is unique to you. We can attempt to replicate the paths of others and may even achieve a level of success in doing so, but the truth is we will never achieve the full scope of our potential without discovering and venturing down our own path.
“And so I insist—and God backs me up on this—that there be no going along with the crowd, the empty-headed, mindless crowd. They’ve refused for so long to deal with God that they’ve lost touch not only with God but with reality itself. They can’t think straight anymore. Feeling no pain, they let themselves go in sexual obsession, addicted to every sort of perversion.”
Here Paul outlines what can happen to us absent this direction: we succumb to our base desires. We are left wandering hoping to experience fulfillment through something other than what we were intended for, or at least to forget our failures. But that doesn't have to be us. We can still control our narrative and inject new direction and purpose into our lives.
What then is the application this week? Like Paul tells us, our first step is to let go of the crowd. Next we need to line out what we hope to accomplish and how we intend to get there. And once we have locked in this course, we need to aggressively pursue it while still remaining flexible to life's many changes. If successful, we can live a intentional and better yet fulfilled and purposeful life. At a minimum we walk away with at least an answer as to our grand life intentions.
Have a great week and as always, subscribe and share with a friend.
-the contrary disciple