This originally appeared as a weekly evo on www.whillschurch.org.

Had this great conversation spring up during our Men’s Fraternity small group time yesterday morning which proves two myths wrong.

Myth 1: 6 am is too early for any kind of deep conversation.
Myth 2: Men can’t really talk about deep spiritual matters longer than 10 minutes.

But that’s not the real point I’m trying to make here. The topic is our motives.

When David faced Goliath, was he doing so because he was genuinely concerned about God’s reputation and the future of Israel or was he really that cocky and self-absorbed to think he could do what an entire army of men for 40 days hadn’t done?

My contention? What if both are true? David is a great example. We like think that David was this innocent young boy just standing up for God and had more faith than anyone else in the nation. What if he was just a little on the cocky side, self-absorbed youngest child trying to make a name for himself because he thought his life had a greater purpose than those around him? Or what if there was a little bit of both in him?

We tend to paint people into “either/or” categories concerning their motives. We treat everybody with broad black and white strokes. “She knew that would hurt me and she did it on purpose.” “He knew I wanted that and that’s why he picked it so that it would upset me.” She meant to. He meant to.

We treat everyone like this except for one person – ourselves. When we mess up or have our actions questions, we immediately run to the grey areas. “Well, I meant no harm, I was trying to do this. i was trying to help.”

And most of the time – we are sincerely telling the truth. It’s just funny how that doesn’t always translate over to the other people that we interact with. Shortsighted, maybe?

David let’s us deal with us problem in a removed manner. I don’t think David faced Goliath solely because he was a man after God’s own heart. That wasn’t all that was in David’s heart. See Bathsheba story.

Yes, David WANTED to please God MOST of the time. I believe that. But notice that before David goes out to fight Goliath, he finds out what the reward is from the King. He takes advantage of the opportunity to have a face to face with the King.

And David wasn’t short on confidence either. “I’ve killed the lion and the bear. I’ve beat them both down with my bare hands.” Then he adds – The Lord has delivered them to me. (Don’t take me word for it – read the story – 1 Samuel 17.)

David has both self-less and selfish motives driving him to face Goliath. He is neither an altruistic saint sent to deliver his people nor is he a total self-absorb jerk. It’s there in his words. Yes, I’ve got the skill set to kill this giant. And yes, God has been with me and will be with me in the future. Yes, I can kill this Philistine. Yes, God will deliver this giant into my hands.

Yes, I love my country and my God and want to fight for them both. Yes, I want to know what the payoff is when I win.

It’s both/and, not either/or.

And most of us function the same way. Think of all the different thoughts and angles that go on in our heads when we make a decision? Why do we parent the way we parent? Why do we speak the way we speak? Why are we involved in the things we are involved in? It’s seldom one reason we do anything.

And I think God’s grace covers that. I think he recognizes our heart, sees the general direction we are trying to go and goes there with us. His grace covering our motives, his hands disciplining us back when needed.

Does this make me a cynic on the human race that I don’t think anyone’s motives are 100% altruistic all the time? Does it make David any less of a man of God that he asked how he would be rewarded? Does it detract from God’s glory at all that David had great skill with the slingshot?

I don’t think so. If anything, this is just more evidence of God’s unending grace covers us all – to some extent or another.

And it’s just another reason why I love Him and why I pray daily that He gets the last voice.

But if He doesn’t…I’m praying that God’s grace covers that.

There is pretty good evidence that He does.

This originally was written for Western Hills as a weekly devo.

Allow me to introduce you to some English family slang – pear-shaped. When something goes pear-shaped – it means that something or some experience had the promise of being very, very good but it didn’t. It went…pear-shaped instead.

The term works on a couple of levels. First, pears look incredible beautiful and their taste isn’t. Second, the appearance of a pear is basically an out of shape green apple. A green apple gone bad. Hence the term – Pear-Shaped.

Maybe the metaphor isn’t doing anything for you but you get my meaning, right? Something goes bad, an expectation isn’t met, a reality that isn’t good sets in.

Could be as trivial as the water intake valve on your washer is messed up and you need to replace it. Or it could be a bit more serious than that. A job that is sucking the life out of you. A marriage that is dieing. A relationship that has soured. Poor health. Dealing with mean people.

Pear-shaped.

…Don’t worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; or think about your body, what you will wear. Isn’t life more than food and the body more than clothing?

Look at the birds of the sky…aren’t you worth more than they? Jesus

It’s hard to keep this perspective when things go south. Who are we kidding? At times it almost seems impossible to believe those words.

Yet…they are true. And those who HAVE preserved through the pear-shaped experiences will attest to this. They also have a couple of disciplines and practices that help them through their pear-shaped experience.

1. The real battle is spiritual. Whatever is going on in the physical, remember the real battle is spiritual over more than just temporal things. I can put on the armor of God when things go bad and it always helps. (Ephesians 6:10-18)

2. Eat something. Not physically, spiritually. Get back in the Word, get back in prayer. Read a biography or other good back that is going to put fuel back inside your soul. My staple – My Utmost for His Highest.

3. Stay In The Car Don’t quit. God uses all of these experiences for our good. Doesn’t mean he caused it or is responsible for it – although he MAY be. It does mean that God is using this experience to shape something in or out of you. He can shape you if you leave or quit. Stay in there.

4. Get some teammates. Ask for help and prayer. A life group is HUGE in this area. You will see the different when a group of people start praying and encouraging you.

5. Lift your eyes up.

I lift my eyes towards the mountains. Where will my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of Heaven and Earth. Psalm 121:1-2

Perspective is everything. Being able to look up and be reminded – God is still God. He still loves people and is pursuing them. He’s still working through me and on me.

Big breath…yes, He is.

Then maybe those pear-shape experiences won’t be so…well…pear-shaped.

It’ll be quiet again this week as I wrap up some teaching and get ready for 2012.

I know that I need to be in the NOW when I teach but looking ahead to 2012…I’m really, really excited about the journey I think God is taking me on in the Scriptures. It’s leaping off the pages right now.

But I wanted to come out of the cave a bit and just say — Hi…and I’ll be back soon.

This is too awesome. There needs to be a whole line of these kinds of posters.

There is some argument online as to who is originally responsible for this. So I will link them both.

Portraitoftheartistasayoungman
SD Smith

I’ve lost 27 pounds since May.  I’ve got about 20 more to go but my favorite part of this whole journey is answering the question ‘how have you dropped all that weight?  Are you doing the South Beach diet?  The hormone plan?  The starve yourself skinny program?’

It’s actually called the ‘get off your rear-end and walk 3.5 miles a day’ program.

I know…it’s an original and I’m waiting on the copyright and trademark to go through. 

I don’t think those other programs would have worked for me.  First of all, it wasn’t just about dropping a few pounds.  I want to drop close to 50.  And I didn’t just want to look like I lost weight, I wanted to be in shape.  I didn’t want to be winded after walking up the stairs.  I was tired of being tired.  I wanted to be able to walk uphill both ways again. 

You get what I’m saying?  It wasn’t just about looking lighter or skinnier.  It was about being healthier.  I wanted to BE better.  And that is an altogether different prospect than just losing weight. 

There’s only way to get in shape.  It’s the ‘get off your rear-end and walk the 3.5 miles everyday even when you don’t feel like’ program.  You have to sweat, move, work, and then lather, rinse, and repeat over and over again.  And I wasn’t going to be successful at that without some one doing it with me. 

This situation applies spiritually as well, you know.  If I just want to drop a few pounds to look better spiritually speaking – memorize a few verses of scripture, show up a few more times at church…maybe give a little bit of money or pray out loud at bedtime. 

But if you want to BE in spiritually fit, that’s a whole other endeavor.  It will require some exercise, some sweat, some discipline.  It’s taking that extra step of actually understanding what the verse that you memorized and try to apply it in your life.  It’s choosing to serve others.  Or maybe risking some of your comfort by getting involved in a life group. 

Looking healthy and being healthy are two very different things. 

That’s one of the reasons I really love this Art of Marriage series.  The night sessions and the workbook are about putting on the running shoes, not just a crash diet to drop a few pounds.  And it’s work but it’s worth it.

This week in our night session we are going to look at conflict resolution.  Learning how to fight fair and constructively is REALLY putting on the running shoes.   

There is still space to join us! Come check it out.