November 13
November 13
What do you value most in life? What influences the choices you make?
I’m going to say something that might surprise you. You may value your life too much. What do I mean? You may love what is comfortable and pleasurable too much. Your desire for respect and appreciation might be extreme. You may overvalue achievement and success. You may enjoy material things too much. You may love being right and in control too much. You may overvalue physical attractiveness or strength. Do you value your life too much? If you do, you will resist when the Lord calls you to something hard. If you overvalue your life, you will be tempted to question God’s goodness, faithfulness, and love in times of suffering. If you love your life too much, you will tend to choose what you think is best for you rather than what God says is best.
God never promised that he would exercise his infinite power to make your life predictable and comfortable. He never promised you a life free of suffering. He never promised that you would escape mockery, betrayal, or rejection. He never promised that you would be surrounded by lots of human love and respect. In fact, he has promised the opposite.
God makes it clear in his word that, for our good and his glory, he will lead us through the unexpected, the unwanted, and the difficult. In the hands of our Lord, suffering is a workroom of glory and grace. God will take you places you don’t really want to go, to produce in you and through you what couldn’t be produced in any other way.
The apostle Paul stands as an example for us of what it means not to value your life too much. The following moment in Paul’s life has been recorded and preserved for us because God loves us. In faithful, rescuing grace, the Lord speaks to a struggle many of us experience:
Behold, I am going to Jerusalem, constrained by the Spirit, not knowing what will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment and afflictions await me. But I do not account my life of any value nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God. (Acts 20:22–24)
Paul knows that suffering awaits him in Jerusalem, as it has in many of the cities to which God has called him. So why is Paul willing? His reason is clear: “I do not count my life of any value nor as precious to myself.” Paul doesn’t value his own comfort and ease so much that he would say no to God’s calling. Paul values finishing his life well and continuing to testify to the gospel of grace.
Is there something that God is calling you to, but that you are avoiding because you value your life too much?