Not one of us is the Christian that we ought to be. There is not a person here who is an ideal Christian. There is not one of us who is – 100% – the sort of person we could be. I won’t get personal, and I probably don’t need to be more specific, because down in the depths of our hearts we know what I have said is true. The man who loves the Lord with all his heart, soul, mind and strength, may not love the brethren as he should. And the one who loves the brethren, may not have any concern for that “the stupid unbeliever.” The person who has all his theological ducks in a row, may be an unfriendly curmudgeon. And the friendly, loving saint may have hidden, unconfessed sin, which isn’t as hidden as he thinks. There is not a perfect saint among us.
Why is that true? If we wanted, we could have a long series of messages on that topic. That series could start with the depraved nature of man, and what salvation accomplishes and doesn’t immediately accomplish. As long as we live in this world, there remains in us many aspects of the fallen of Adam. Just as holiness is the prevailing attribute of God, there is at least one prevailing sin in saints – pride. At least one message in that series should deal with poor preaching and pastoral leadership. And another would have to deal with inattention, and a lack of willingness to hear the Word of God. Messages might focus on the nature of the church, and how poorly we relate to each other in our needs. There could be a dozen or more lessons in a series like this. And at least one of those messages would have to deal with motivation – motivation to be our best.
I hesitate to use the word “motivation,” because it takes on the air of psychology or public relations. Despite what other churches are doing, we don’t want Madison Avenue type promotions – either for enticing the lost to our services, or for encouraging the saints to serve the Lord. Christians don’t need hypnotism, group therapy, mass-hysteria, or anything else to get moving for God. We will never resort to gimmicks, bribes and give-aways to get church members to serve the Lord. What we need is a good dose of Biblical-based motivation. We need mature motivation – as opposed to immature motivation. I think that we can actually see both when we turn to the Word of God.
What were the arguments for serving Jehovah in the Old Testament?
Deuteronomy 28 gives us a good look at two major motivations. Notice verses 1-14 – What we have here is the classic “carrot on the stick.” The farmer couldn’t get his donkey to pull his wagon, so he tied a carrot to a string and attached it to the end of a long stick. He could then sit in his cart and dangle the carrot out in front of his donkey, and the beast would pull to reach the carrot, but never really get to it. One major aspect of Old Testament motivation was to offer the Jews “utopia.” This is one of the simplest forms of getting creatures to do what we want them to do. But like the donkey and the carrot, it works best with those who don’t think very well. This is how we get animals to do what we want them to do. And this is the technique of the politician. Sometimes we let the donkey get to the carrot, but most of the time we don’t or we substitute a rotten turnup instead. It’s all about instant gratification.
As I say, this is a somewhat infantile way of getting things done – it works with children. The problem is that children grow up and so do their desires. What happens when one politician offers a ten dollar gift to everyone who votes for him, but then along comes another who offers twenty dollars, and then a third promises fifty? You may be able to get your 8-year-old to do chores for a dollar a week allowance, but it won’t work for a 15-year-old. Such tactics have destroyed churches.
Another effective, but immature and temporary motivation can be seen in verse 15. “But it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command thee this day; that all these curses shall come upon thee, and overtake thee.” This too can get things done – but again for the more immature. “If you don’t do what I am telling you, I will ground you for a week, or a month, a year, or for all eternity.” Of course, this is nearly impossible to enforce in a church, where we believe in eternal salvation. The only thing that we can do is remove people from our membership, and that has nothing to do with their salvation. But then again, for those immature and unbiblical churches which believe that people can loose their salvation, this works just fine.
Both of these forms of motivation might be called “extrinsic.” They have their source and power from outside the individual. They are not really New Testament forms of motivation.
Turn to II Corinthians 4 to look at several better forms of motivation.
Here we see that the New Testament calls for our service and obedience from within us. The Lord says to his children, “Because I have already blessed you, won’t you do this and this for me?” For example there is the argument of the mercies of God in verse 1. “Therefore seeing we have this ministry, as we have received mercy, we faith not.” Paul says in effect, “God has been so good to me that I refuse to fail in my response.” What sort of mercies has the Lord bestowed upon you? Lamentations 3:22 – “It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions faith not.” Do I need to recount what lead to and took place on the cross? “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.”
Flip the page to II Corinthians 5:9 – “Wherefore we labour, that whether present or absetn, we may be accepted of him.” Paul’s joy was to be pleasing in the sight of the Saviour. His attitude wasn’t like that of Elijah – “He said, I have been very jealous for the LORD God of hosts: because the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.” Paul referred to that same event and quoted those words in Romans 11, but they weren’t his words or attitude. There was an intrinsic motivation – an internal motivation in Paul. It was a part of his character – it displayed maturity. Our thrill, our motivation, our desire ought to be simply the smile of God – not some physical reward – either positive or negative.
II Corinthians 5:11 adds another extrinsic motivator. If you are a child of god, you will one day stand before our Saviour/Judge. Your actions will be evaluated – your motives will be assayed. And underlaying both – your heart will be examined.
And that takes us to another intrinsic motivator. You might think of the Bema – the Judgment Seat of Christ – in the same light as Deuteronomy 28, but it is not. The Christian has no need to fear the terror of the Lord, as he stands before Christ. Will we be embarrassed? In some sense we certainly will, but quite likely the joy that we have in the Lord will remove that particular shadow. Certainly the Lord is not surprised by our miserable failures. And we will not be standing there with people unlike ourselves. The Judgment Seat of Christ should not be a major contributor to our service of God today.
On the other hand, verse 14 makes reference to the love of Christ. This isn’t talking about our love for the Lord, but of His love of us. Shouldn’t that love push, encourage, motivate us in so many different ways, to be more and better than we are at this moment? Paul was forced to say that sometimes the love of Christ squeezed him.
Now skip over to verse 1 of chapter 7. “Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.” What promises have been given to the child of God? To You? There are a multitude – large and small – which God, who cannot lie, has promised to us. Some of the large ones include the promise of the Comforter, Christ’s intercession and God’s protection. With these in the background, there are so many reasons to strive to be better servants and more Christ-like Christians. Why are so many aged Christians still babes in Christ – pouty, crying, wilful, almost useless. We need to put away the childish things and display more Christian character and maturity.
In II Corinthians 10:1 Paul gives another incentive – the character of Christ Himself. “Now I Paul myself beseech you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ…” Jesus once said, “If you love me, keep my commandments.” How much incentive is there in any of our hearts to worship, love and serve the Saviour?