“We are not commending ourselves to you again but giving you cause to boast about us, so that you may be able to answer those who boast about outward appearance and not about what is in the heart. For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.”
2 Corinthians 5:12-15 ESV
The world lauds those who are all in for some cause or another. Athletes that dedicate body and soul for a crown, a title, or a trophy, are everywhere admired. “That’s what it takes,” they say. When Michael Jordan won his first NBA title with the Bulls he hugged the trophy and wept in the locker room after the game. Everyone could see what it meant to him and we admired that intense level of dedication.
Indeed, Mr. Jordan was “out of his mind” for the NBA title…crazy dedicated, fully committed. (And for the record, anyone reading this who thinks that Lebron is better than Michael should stop reading right now and go repent. Just saying.)
But seriously, it’s like this that Paul says he’s “out of his mind” for God and the gospel message. He’s in “his right mind” for the church, reasoning and persuading everyone to be reconciled to the Lord through the cross of Christ. Jordan knew what the prize was. It was that trophy after they beat Magic’s Lakers four games to one. Paul’s trophy is that you and I would be saved. He’s out of his mind working so that others would know the Lord and repent of their sin. If he’s hugging anything to his chest and weeping, it’s the truth of the gospel and not an earthly trophy.
It’s like this that we should all seek to live.
What has become of that NBA title back from June 1991? The grass has withered and the flower has faded. Mr. Jordan’s youth and all that superlative athleticism has gone away. But, yet, the Word of the Lord still abides and will always abide. It’s for this – this is the logic – that we’re all-in, fully committed and out of our minds.
Now, granted, an NBA title, or a successful business enterprise, or any other earthly achievement, are wonderful things. The point isn’t that we’re so “out of our minds” that we literally don’t do anything. On the contrary, we’re committed to the Lord like Jordan was to winning the title. We make it our ambition to live such a life that others are blessed. The life that Christ lived wherein He emptied Himself of His divine privileges, even consenting to death on the cross, was for us. He died for us so that we might live for Him and others.
The application for us is simple: live in light of the love that Christ has poured into you. Continue to meditate upon the great truth that the God-man, Jesus Christ, died for you.
What a life-changing fact!
It changes everything about us.
We no longer view life’s daily grind as we once did, but as a training ground of our sanctification. Our “job” is our vocation…our calling. We seek to do it with skill so that His name is honored and others are served through our God-fearing efforts. Our home life is established whether we’re married with children or single and we seek to be a blessing to others. The love of Christ controls us in that we’re more worried about the salvation of others than anything else. If you’re a mother, a father, a brother or sister…in Christ you seek to show Him to those around you.
That the love of Christ would control us is the compelling goal of our lives. If Jordan pressed on and trained hard for his trophy, we study the Word, and we pray, and we work at our earthly craft, in the same vein. Many of us live all wrong, without this as our primary goal. For some reason we’re afraid to be for Christ as men like Jordan are for their earthly goals. We don’t want to be known as a fanatic and, therefore, live with compartmentalized contradictions. We end up hating our job because we don’t see it as an opportunity to serve the Lord and neighbor. We’ve let the world define how we think of things. We ignorantly accept the secularism of our current day where we think that the church is the Lord’s but the world belongs to the world.
The truth is that we can and should all live with the sure knowledge that Christ is in all that we do and that there’s no neutrality. Every activity that we separate from God is drained of its meaning. Imagine that there is one person in the Kingdom of Heaven because of some small thing you did or said…or didn’t do if, say, you quietly refrained from gossiping at work or something like that. This is the mindset of the Christian wherein the love of Christ controls, compels and gives direction to our every day life.
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