What do you currently pursue with passion? Are you pursuing anything? A career? A marriage? I looked up the definition of passion. Noun 1. Strong and barely controllable emotion. 2. A state or outburst of such emotion. I also found in the Merriam-Webster dictionary Passion: the sufferings of Christ between the night of the Last Supper and his death. It's interesting that the dictionary defines passion as the sufferings of Christ. As we celebrated Easter yesterday you probably heard the story of Christ's death, burial and resurrection found in Matthew 26-28.
Have you ever thought about pursuing God with passion (barely controllable emotion)? In Proverbs 21:21 it says, He who pursues righteousness and love finds life, prosperity and honor. And then in 1 Timothy 6:11 it says But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness. God is righteousness. We were created in His image (Genesis 1:26). God is giving us a recipe for success. He tells us pursue righteousness.
Can you imagine what life would be like if we completely surrendered every area of our life over to God's authority and pursued Him with the passion that He pursues us? Going back to the Merriam-Webster definition of passion, I can see why Christ's sufferings between the night of last supper and His death. 1. He was betrayed by Judas Matthew 26:14 (man in His inner circle) 2. Was rejected by His own people (Sanhedrin-high ranking Jews) Matthew 26:56-63 3. Another man, Peter, in His inner circle denies Him three times Matthew 26:69-74; He was beaten, mocked, spat on, and ultimately put to death by the cruelest form--death on a cross. He did all of this WILLINGLY! That is passion. His passion brought about our restored relationship with God. Without Christ we would not have a relationship with God.
Hebrews 9:14-15 says How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God! For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance—now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant. In light of this knowledge why would we not want to pursue God with passion?
I have a prayer that I pray--I ask for passion like Paul, wisdom like Solomon, a heart like David, faith like Abraham and a love like Christ but the truth is--Christ is all of these things. Through His blood we are offered the privledge of coming to God asking for any of these things in Christs' name. James 1:5 says If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him.
Ask God to give you a passion to pursue Him--He will do it!
