Feeling brave today? Ready for a motives check? Brace yourself, here it goes! How do you read the Bible? Or, better yet, why do you read God’s Word?
As a parent of a child with serious health challenges our motives can easily become murky. Reading for His guidance can become a tool to manipulate His Word. We can read between the lines and make it say what we want or we can misuse His Word convinced He’s telling us something He’s not. Wait a minute! Those reasons sound the same, don’t they? The difference is in our goal or our motivation, the route we choose to get us to two very different destinations.
The first (reading between the lines) is the Happy Trails route. We take this road when we read what we want to read, looking for guidance that confirms our desires. We want the beautiful scenic route full of sunshine, so we search God’s word for encouragement while also shutting off God’s voice. We read to solidify our own hope, and we miss out on His Message. Because of our motivation, the encouragement we gain is a false encouragement. In the end, we arrive at our destination shocked because it wasn’t where we thought we would be. We’re frustrated and confused – our hope and encouragement were built on sand and not His rock after all.
The second route we can take is the very opposite (misusing His Word). It’s the Road to Self-Destruction. This is the road we take when we’re looking for guidance sure we’re doing something wrong. We’re searching Scripture for our mistake and how to remedy it. We use God’s Word to condemn ourselves for our self-perceived failures. For example, I can read Phil. 4: 6-7, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus” (NKJV) and say to myself, “See?! This is why I don’t have peace. This is why I worry all the time. I’m anxious about everything! God says not to be anxious. I’m sinning! IT’S ALL MY FAULT!!” We miss the part that explains it is He who will give us peace that we can’t understand, the peace that guards our hearts and minds. When He does that then we will not be anxious. In our need to find a reason for why all of this is happening, it’s too easy to blame ourselves. Do we really think God is so cruel to only give us peace after we’ve gotten rid of our own anxiety? That doesn’t make sense does it? But, that’s often what we think.
This was just one example of a verse I often see abused or, worse yet, used against us parents. Has a well meaning person told you not to be anxious but to “trust in God”? There is nothing more impossible than to not worry about your child, right? Philippians 4: 6-7 shows us that God does not ask us to do something impossible without helping us to do it. Because of Him (not you), you can have peace. It’s His promise.
There’s one more road we can also take – one more not so good reason to read the Bible. It’s the “Manipulate God” path, and it’s tricky. It’s easy to find yourself all of the sudden taking this route. It’s based out of our need for Him. We’re dependent on God, and His Word draws us close to Him. What? That sounds good, doesn’t it? Yes, it does sound good, but once again, we have to check our motives. If our motives are not pure, our desperation for His presence can lead us to use the discipline of reading Scripture as a way to manipulate Him into our lives and into action. We believe the act will make us holy, and He will then deem our prayers worthy of being answered. Are we desperate for our Father or desperate for what He can do? Ouch. Tough question, huh?
If our motives are pure, we are desperate for His Word because we love Him. We want to know Him more. We want to spend time with Him. Is God’s Word, “more precious to me than thousands of pieces of silver and gold (Psalm 119:72)” to us?
OK, what if our motives haven’t been so pure? What can we do? Well, the first thing NOT to do, is beat yourself up. We’re human, our wants, our love for others, and our hurts will all effect how and why we spend time with God. But, you know what, He knows that. He’s not surprised, AND He still loves us! He loves us so much that we don’t have to solve this problem of messy motives by ourselves. We only have to take a very simple step, and that’s to ask His forgiveness and then ask Him to purify our motives. That’s it. Really. (Oh, it doesn’t hurt to ask Him to purify us often. We all need it!)
It does help to be able to identify your un-pure motives clearly. When you can see it, you can name it and give it to God. It also becomes easier for you to recognize it when it rears it’s ugly head allowing you to stop it in it’s tracks. It isn’t always easy to identify messy motives, let me help with this powerful tool “Messy Motives and Wrong Way Roads Bundle“.
Believe me, it’s a prayer He loves. I’ve been on many Wrong Way Roads with my own messy motives, and He’s always gently picked me up and placed me on the right path. He’ll do the same for you, my friend, so, what are you waiting for? Ask! He loves a heart that wants to desire Him purely!
In His Love,
Kimberly
If you made it through this article (wink!), you’re ready for “The Faith Challenge”! Leave the messy motives and wrong way roads behind for a strong, pure faith that pleases Him. You can find The Faith Challenge here:
