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Goals, Spiritual
(From Forerunner Commentary)

Matthew 6:31-34  (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up) Our focus should be toward the end result. He gives this encouragement and admonishment to motivate us to understand and live all of life in relation to where it ends. Will life end in the Kingdom of God or in the Lake of Fire? That is a choice that each person makes. Even in the everyday, mundane things, eating and drinking, going to work, getting along with others, and so on, God wants His people to relate those daily experiences to their goal, the Kingdom of God. John W. Ritenbaugh Guard the Truth!

Romans 12:1-2  (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up) If a person has no specific spiritual goal for life, then he will be forced by circumstances to turn all of his attention regarding his life goals and ambitions to the material and the secular. There is no way to avoid this because people will, by nature, conform to the world around them. Now if his spiritual goal is the common Protestant view of immediately being born again at conversion and going off to heaven at the end of his life, he can make a few preparations for life after death. However, only the right goal can fully encourage the right preparation. Not being conformed to this world but to Christ requires consciously choosing to be like Him! This is vastly different from what it is like when we were born into this life. We had no choice then. We were by nature a slave of Satan the Devil and of the society around us. When God intervenes in our lives, calling us to Him, He begins to reveal Himself to us. He frees us from is our bondage to Satan so we can consciously choose to be conformed to the image of His Son—and we will not be unconsciously weaved into the mold of this world. This means that our part in His creative process is to come to the knowledge of God. We are to analyze and to understand its practical application according to the commands and the intent of His Word, and consciously choose to do it. This is the pathway that, by the grace of God, will result in our being born again as His very sons in His Kingdom! John W. Ritenbaugh We Shall Be God! (Part 2)

1 Peter 2:11  (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up) A pilgrim is not a wanderer. Psalm 119:10 says, "Don't let me wander from the path." A pilgrim has a definite goal in mind. He may be passing through. He may not take up residence along the way that he is traveling, but he is traveling to a specific destination. He is on a pilgrimage. Perhaps we are most familiar with the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca. Muslim pilgrims may travel from one country to another, but they always have their sights on Mecca. Christians who keep God's holy days make a pilgrimage every fall to the Feast of Tabernacles. They may travel through many states, but they have a singular destination in mind. They follow the route mapped out to get there. They are pilgrims, and there is a route—a way—that they must follow to arrive there. There is a proper way to play a card game, a basketball game, or a football game. Is it possible to play a coherent game when each player does what he just "feels" is right, if he has his own set of rules, his own way? Is it possible to play a coherent game when some of the rules are left out? Hardly. The game immediately degenerates and will not achieve what the game's designers intended. There is a way to repair a mechanical device. There is a way to assemble things. We experience this with things we buy that must be assembled. If we do not follow the directions, the dumb thing will not go together! The point is this: God is not just trying to save us. He is producing a product that is in His image, and there is a way that will produce it. The commandments—all ten of them—play major roles in His way. If we remove any one of them, the product will be deficient. It will not be assembled in the right way. It will be lacking. Some people think God is stupid for assigning a particular day for worship, but He has reasons for it. Thus, a way is a method, a manner, a direction, or a route to follow—and that way has rules. John W. Ritenbaugh The Covenants, Grace and Law (Part 2)

 

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