Rebooting Resolutions (part III)

Yesterday I wrote about the why of God's goal for you. Today I will look at the what. The big goal is to be liberated to be driven by love (Gal. 5:13, 22,23). The freedom Jesus gives is a freedom, not just from wrong actions, but from inordinate passions or desires. He can set you free to a new driving passion: love for Him and others.

Gal. 5:13 For you were called to freedom, brethren; only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

In years past, I was approaching goals with the assumption that my desires are all right, but weak. I no longer make that assumption. I have realized that even my approach to Christian service is tainted by desires for recognition and respect from people. In other words, idolatry affects my approach to spiritual goals. But I am encouraged by the freedom Paul declares:

Romans 6:12-16 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its lusts… 14 For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace… 16 Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one whom you obey?

Jesus Christ offers a freedom from self—not in the sense of self-rejection, but a freedom from inordinate desires and cravings. In fact, there is an unfortunate translation in Romans 6:12 (“lusts”), which is the word epithumia. More accurate than "lusts" would be “desires.” We tend to associate the word lust with sexual appetite, but epithumia is about any inordinate desire.
As Tim Keller says, “If you want something and it’s a good thing, and someone gets in your way, you get mad. But if you want something and its an ultimate thing, and someone gets in your way, you are bitter, you’re furious, you can’t deal with the anger, you can’t forgive the person. It’s inordinate.”

In Galatians 5, Paul mentions “the deeds of the flesh.” These reveal our lack of freedom: sensuality, idolatry, strife, jealousy, envying, outbursts of anger, disputes, drunkenness (Gal. 5:19-21). These things are examples of inordinate desire and our reactions when we can’t have them. Sensuality, for example is an inordinate desire to feel good. It reveals a lack of the freedom to be driven by love.

Freedom through Christ also is a positive freedom—the freedom to love—to relate to and serve others than yourself.
Gal. 5:22,23 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.

Love is the main idea here in the fruit, and seems to lead to the others. Love for God and people--rather than by insecurity, idolatry and lust, which is a slavery. The drives of idolatry are obsessive, addictive, and disappointing.

Human beings have always pursued joy and peace, though they usually the employed the more secular word ‘happiness.’ But Christians feel obliged to add that those who pursue happiness never find it. Joy and peace and extremely elusive blessings, Happiness is a will-o’-the wisp, a phantom. Even as we reach out a hand to grasp it, it vanishes into thin air. For joy and peace are not suitable goals to pursue; they are by-products of love. God gives them to us, not when we pursue them, but when we pursue him and others in love. (John Stott, The Contemporary Christian, 149)

The fruit of the Spirit is not a to-do list. It is an exciting vision of what I could become if I let the Spirit of Christ free me.

God wants to deal with your drives and passions, not just your behaviors, and not just your thinking. He wants to give you the desire to love—to make it the thing you want to do. The Spirit gives the power, but also the passion. Do you want to be free to be driven by love? I think you do if you have the Spirit of Christ. You may have been wounded or discouraged in the attempt. You may have become enslaved to some inordinate desires, but you want this freedom. Don’t protect you heart from pain by resigning to cynicism about God’s goal for you.
Next time, I will look at the how of God's goal: "walking by the Spirit."