Happiness or Holiness?

 

It has been over seven months since my last blog and over nine months since my Major Depressive Episode that left me bed bound.  It has been a very slow recovery that has required a lot of patience and kindness for myself with a deepening trust and dependence upon God for my healing.  What I have noticed is that there was nothing that I could do in my own abilities to help me regain my memory, my physical strength, my concentration, or ability to read and write in the way that I love to express myself.  One things is certain, God has been faithful to me through it all and is taking me deeper in my relationship and wisdom of knowing who God is.  That deepening insight comes by increasing my consciousness and awakening to my desperate need for my Savior, Jesus Christ because of my sinful nature.  During my prayer and devotion time this morning, God gave me a revelation and shared with me the importance of seeking holiness instead of happiness.

I, just as Saul/Paul, am the worst sinner.  Today we live in a culture where we believe we are entitled to happiness instead of seeking holiness.  Out of our deep emptiness and void we seek in all the wrong places to fill this dark hole within us with inappropriate relationships, sexual impurity, divorce, living dual or false lives, seeking success, status, gluttony, addictions and on and on and on.  We seek the temporary idols in our life hoping to make us happy not realizing in the moment they do offer happiness, but it is not everlasting.  In fact, often these very things are sinful lusts, desires and addictions that opens the doorway for further destructive consequences in our life. 

How can I speak so blatantly about this?  Because this is in fact what God has revealed to me when He came to deliver and rescue me from my sinful pleasures seeking happiness that not only scarred my soul, but inadvertently left scars on individuals lives around me.  Sin hurts everyone in humanity and creation because we are all interconnected.  Jesus says, 'What you have done to the least of these, you have done to me."  The good deeds and the bad deeds all affect those around us when we choose to live in sin.  We are cohesively missing the mark for what God has called and intended for us.  God does give us freewill to decide how we want to live.  Our choices must be to question ourselves  and ask, "Who are we living for?"  Are we seeking self gratification seeking fleeting happiness, or are we living and seeking God and his holiness in every detail of our lives?  Don't get me wrong, I do believe God wants us to experience happiness, but not at the expense of hurting or harming others which is what sin does.  When we seek holiness, we receive a Joy in the Lord that leads to Salvation .

Jesus humbly came for us not seeking happiness, but for righteousness and holiness.  God had a divine intervention and mission for Jesus to fulfill that would be a sacrifice for all of humanity and creation.  That is how much God loves us and wants to spend eternity with us. 

I often hear people say, "Live life to the fullest doing what makes you happy because you only get to live this one life."  That is where they are missing the mark.  We get a more abundant life in eternity standing in front of the Lord without fault experiencing joy and praise continuously.  We exclaim excuses of why it is okay to compromise and live in sin because of a culture and society that deems it appropriate.  Maybe the times have changed, but God's word is clear that He is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.  God's word does not change based on our feelings, desires, culture or the times.  Sin is sin.  God gave Moses on the tablets the Ten Commandments.  Jesus also gave us the way of right living in the Sermon on the Mount.  There is no one sin that is worse or better than another.  All sin is missing the mark and falling short of what God is calling us to.  Sin is rebellion and separates us from an intimate relationship with God.  Today we don't like to offend or hurt others feelings confronting or acknowledging sin individually, corporately, structurally, economically, socially or politically. 

All sin comes with consequences and there will be wrath and judgment for falling away from God.  This is what God has revealed to me as He has  graciously and lovingly shown to me my own known and hidden sin.  I too just as Saul/Paul am the greatest sinner of all.  I have violated everyone of the Ten Commandments in my previous way of being before coming to know Jesus as my Lord and Savior.  I may not have physically violated all of the commandments, but I have violated them in my thoughts, words, and heart.  This is the same as if I had done it physically because God already knows all of this about me and this is where the root of sin can enter and take over. 

So the challenge for all of us is that we can't do this on our own.  God knows that.  Jesus even surrounded himself with twelve disciples to journey with him to be witnesses.  We too must surround ourselves with spirit-filled, God-loving and God-fearing individuals that we can be vulnerable and transparent to sharing our hurts, temptations and shortcomings.  This needs to be done just as Jesus met others in love and compassion meeting others right where they are at on their spiritual journey.  The enemy wants to isolate us so that he can continue to deceive us and put reasoning into our hearts and minds of why it is okay to make excuses to live in sin.  I have been there and done that as well.

I am not speaking to you out of judgment or condemnation, but I am speaking to you from my own personal narrative in love and truth.  This is what God has revealed to me where I now understand the depth of humanity and creation's sin and our desperate need for our Savior.  We are faced with trials and temptations every day.  I continually have to seek Jesus to show me how to live a holy life especially in a world where it feels as though we are walking against the ways of the world. 

With Christmas nearing and reflecting on the significance of the birth of Jesus Christ, it is a gift that is overwhelming to comprehend.  For that reason, I don't want to live my life taking what Jesus did for me in vain.  It is a gift of deep unfailing and unending love, mercy, grace and eternal salvation.  This gift, we must not selfishly hold, but we must proclaim, confess and exalt the name of Jesus .  When I become weak, I go the Garden of Gethsemane with Jesus remembering his own despair where he was seeking God's will and not his own.  He asked three times for his destiny to pass him by if possible.  Jesus admitted that his flesh was weak, but the spirit was willing.  Jesus could not endure his impending death on his own, but with God it was possible.  Jesus chose God's will and holiness instead of instant gratification for happiness so that we all may experience eternal rewards with the Lord with eternal happiness, joy, praise healing and life more abundant than we can comprehend or imagine.  We are asked to trust, be obedient and remain faithful just as Jesus did for us. 

What are you seeking???????  Happiness or Holiness???????  Temporary Gain or Eternal Life???????


(photos are shared from internet)