Mixed Bag of “Emotivations”

I’ve discovered what a mixed bag of emotions and motives I am. 

Let me be honest; I have messy motivations, muddled thinking, and messy conversations and do things I don’t want to do. Romans 7:20  Becoming a follower of Jesus didn’t change that fact overnight. I still like to think I’m right. I still behave like a perfectionist in a lot of ways. I’m still an introvert who still struggles with friendships. But all that honest assessment aside, there is One Name above it all. One Name makes those realities not something I need to cover up or hide anymore. 

Jesus.

Those weaknesses, coupled with humility, vulnerability, and transparency, connect us in our universal human need for God’s saving and transforming grace. The common denominator as we humans struggle is that we all need someone to rescue us from those struggles.

We all need Jesus. Romans 5:6 

God has shown me some thinking and behaviors I need to take off and some thinking and behavior I need to put on. Ephesians 4:22 I’ve had to come to terms with things I thought were true but weren’t. Romans 1:25, As well as emotional tendencies that served me to cope as a kid but as an adult, led me down a dangerously slippery slope.

God is working through His Holy Spirit inside His kids – even in the middle of our mess.

The Holy Spirit helps us figure out who we are in a relationship with God. And discover who He made us to be – Daughters – no matter our age. So even though the current state of our physical body and brain is living with consequences and results from things we’ve done and done to us, we live in a new simultaneous reality.

We have a new heart and a new mind. Ezekiel 36:26 

The tension of living in those two concurrent states makes cultivating godly motivation, thinking, and doing – a step forward, step back, stumble forward, fall down, and get back up kind of a process – passionate and hard, but also joyful and deeply rewarding. 

When Jesus said, “Come to me…” in Matthew 11:28, He already knows all the different motivations that have taken you down this path and that path. So when He sees you coming to Him, the only thing on His mind is the joy of connection, that even for a moment – a brief moment – we’ve recognized need, and He’s enjoying our presence. 

But He still wants a long-term relationship to unravel our old ways until our eyes are opened by faith to a better way. Philippians 1:6

That’s all God has ever wanted. To be in our presence. He loves us so much that before the beginning of the world, He knew that this world would go sideways in sin. But together, the Trinity decided to be united in love and share that with a future creation that would eventually reject and kill Jesus. 

God did it anyway. They (the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) decided to love anyway. Jesus came anyway. 

Our motives don’t have to be pure to start on a journey with God. They just need to be humble enough to recognize our position, receive guidance, and learn from our mistakes. God will finish what He starts.