Given a Purpose

In youth group tonight we were presented The Salvation message. We began by praising God with this incredibly awesome band that I absolutely love (you're welcome). I always love worship during youth group, but something about having a guest band perform makes it so much more inspiring.

We sang for over an hour. It pretty amazing. One of the songs we sang, and I had never heard it before, it spoke to me like none of the others did:

I will live to love you.
I will live to give you praise.
I will live as a child in awe of you.

How can you read those lyrics without being awe-inspired? If we have nothing more to give we are to give him our love and our live and our praise. The last line is my favorite. In Matthew 19:14, Jesus said, "Let the children alone, and do not hinder them from coming to Me; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these." We are to come to God as children. In awe of how great and miraculous He is and live for only Him alone.

I'm sure everyone feels the same way from time to time, but I struggle so much with finding a purpose, something to live for. I mean, yes, we're supposed to live for God. Win people for Jesus. And that's all good. But sometimes when I'm trying to present the gospel or as some people would like to say "force my religion" on someone, I feel like nothing's sinking in and I might be doing more harm than good. That's not to say that we shouldn't share our faith with those who don't yet know Christ. I just feel like someone could do a better job than I do. But then again, I'm planting a seed, right?

You may think this is totally ridiculous, but sometimes I feel like I'm beginning the fulfillment of my purpose through this blog. I realize, however, that if my blog is going to be totally for the glory of God, I have to shift my perspective from wanting it to be about me and my abilities. As much as I'm trying to understand that I was given this gift from God and that he deserves the glory in the first place, it's hard not to think, "Oh, yeah, I remember writing that. I totally rock!" Maybe it's selfish of me to want my blog to be read and the messages in them to be received by more than one person. I want to share my "knowledge" with the world. And I believe that if I'm writing and giving God the glory than it's possible.

It's so easy to get caught up in everything WE can do that we forget what GOD can do THROUGH us. Perhaps my AP Lang blog is preparing me to write something more. God willing, maybe I'll be a famous writer someday. But if that's going to happen it has to start with God being first and foremost.

There's a reason I titled this post "Given a Purpose." If we don't follow God's will for our lives we may never feel like we have a purpose. My purpose is to write for the glory of God and maybe eventually that will lead to bigger things.

Ephesians 3:20-21 says, "Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the gory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen."