Ricky asked me, "Is it okay to have 'wanting to be like Christ' as your sole motivation? Or should that be the byproduct of some other motivation?"My thoughts (search the Scriptures and inquire of the Spirit for real truth!) in bulleted format:
- If by okay you mean acceptable to God...
- I don't know if I ever do anything with one (sole) motivation. There are main (primary) motivations, but still there are many smaller ones that go into a decision or action.
- Also, I also don't know if wanting to be like Christ has ever been a byproduct of another motivation, for me. Becoming like Christ is often a byproduct.
- It has been a primary motivation for me. It has been a smaller motivation for me.
Let's rephrase the question, "Is it acceptable to God to do something primarily because you want to be like Christ?"
Sure, why not? WWJD seems to have come about from this. Anyway, I think that if you do something with that as your main motive, then God will use that both to accomplish His purposes in the world and in you. And eventually, He may be at work in your heart to transform that motivation out of the limelight and make it secondary. Why? Because I do believe that there is a much better motivation -- actually the motivation. That's true, pure, ideal -- for the love of Jesus. This should be the goal, to do something, anything, mainly out of love and not out of fear or to benefit self. But, I think God accepts other good motivations, knowing that we are longing to be motivated by love. Give Him that longing and let Him work in and on you. He will. This is certain.
For it is God who works in you both to will and to act according to His good purpose (Philippians 2:13).
