The Motions.....

Ok, I have officially heard it all, after yesterday’s discovery of Pumpkin Pie flavored Pop Tarts. Now don’t get me wrong I LOVE pumpkin pie and anxiously await its reveal each fall but something just seems odd about flavoring a pop tart like a delicious decadent dessert. Maybe I’m old fashioned but that’s part of the enjoyment, the waiting all year for pumpkin pie season and then indulging for a month until you have pumpkin pie coming out your ears on Thanksgiving. I must admit if I can get my hands on a box I am definitely going to give them a try but it just reminds me once again about how much our society is constantly pushing the limits.

We are always seeking the opportunity to do things bigger, better, earlier and different and never content with just staying the same, tradition. If this wasn’t enough I then heard on the radio that “Black Friday” may be considered obsolete after this year because some stores are starting the big deals on Thanksgiving evening this year instead of the day after Thanksgiving. Once again we have to push the envelope. The Christmas decorations were out even earlier this year at stores, even before Halloween. Speaking of Halloween, what happened to those cheap little costumes we had as kids that were made from thin plastic material and a mask that you could barely see to walk in? Now we have these extravagant costumes with tons of accessories and glitz and glamour and somewhere in the excitement of improving things we have lost the simplicity and joy of it.

Maybe I’m a creature of habit and just don’t like change, but I have a hard time with the idea that we are constantly working to improve things and do things better and bigger in the littlest, most unimportant things in life but when it comes to our faith and our relationship with Christ we are content with the status quo, we are content with staying safe and never pushing the limits. We get in this mindset of only doing the bare minimum, we seek staying the same and never being one to test the waters and take risks. We are willing to compromise spending even less time with family on Thanksgiving over a hot deal at Walmart but would we give up that family time as easily to serve a homeless shelter for Christ?

There is a song by Matthew West called “The Motions” and the words say:

 “I don’t want to go through the motions I don’t want to spend one more day, without Your all consuming passion inside of me. I don’t want to spend my whole life asking what if I had given everything, instead of going through the motions.”

It’s easy to go through the motions every day and just do enough to get by. It’s easy to just meet the bare minimum and do enough to cross it off your “to do” list for the day. But if we really want to seek the fullness that Christ has for us in this life then we can’t sit on the sidelines and play it safe. We don’t take risks in life just because we are bored; we take them because the payoff is worth it. We work hard and push against the odds because we expect the result will outweigh the effort. We push the envelope and are motivated by what we are passionate about and it’s easy to lose sight of what really should be our motivator in all things in this life and that’s Christ. Without Christ we are nothing but through Christ we can do immeasurably more than we could ever hope for.

“Now to Him Who, by (in consequence of) the [action of His] power that is at work within us, is able to [carry out His purpose and] do superabundantly, far over and above all that we [dare] ask or think [infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, hopes, or dreams]—or” Ephesians 3:20