Today we continue looking at question 3 of the DIMES Framework:

M – What MOTIVATES me most?

Yesterday we began to examine what motivates us and drives us through life, overcoming obstacles and difficulties. We saw the first two avenues of motivation – our calling, what we see as the ultimate purpose of our lives, and our compulsion, the priorities of our life that we must achieve over everything else. Now let’s look at the next …

Companions

When we’ve identified our calling in life and the motivating factor that compels us, we must carefully consider the company we choose to keep. This is such an important issue that it appears as the very first issue dealt with in the Psalms:

Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
Psalm 1:1

Our relationships help connect our inner compulsions to how they’re expressed in the real world. The company we keep shapes how our calling and motivations play out in daily life. Those we choose to surround ourselves with will inevitably influence our thinking, our attitudes, and our actions. The age-old problem of peer pressure is not something limited to young people. Generally speaking, we like to be liked, and we tend to assume that differences in thinking prevent people from liking us. Sadly, there is likely an element of truth in this.

We cannot keep close to us those who have unbiblical opinions and ideas and not expect to be influenced in some way. Even if it’s “just” watering down something that used to be a soul-deep, spirit-led conviction and is now a personal opinion or preference – that is damaging enough to make our witness and values less sure, less impactful.

The issue of choosing companions who will influence us for the better is illustrated throughout the Scriptures in relationships such as Naomi and Ruth, Moses and Joshua, and Barnabas and John Mark. The mentoring John Mark received from Barnabas was so impactful that it transformed John Mark from an unreliable missionary companion into someone whom Paul himself admitted was “profitable … for the ministry” – a wonderful example of a helpful relationship.

Ultimately, we need to move beyond the initial reasons why a relationship was formed to a point where we can evaluate which relationships we should prioritise. Only then can we begin to recognise the one relationship we value above all others. That relationship is our motivation. It is the one relationship we’d sacrifice all others to preserve, and for the believer, that should be our relationship with the Lord. Any other connection that helps us maintain that priority is worth keeping, but those who become an impediment to our relationship with Christ need to be reconsidered, and even, in the worst case, abandoned.

Conversations

In all relationships, we are only known by what we choose to reveal to others What we reveal is partially behavioural – our actions and body language portray a particular character that has been moulded by our central motivation. But in order to understand what is within our heart, our mind and soul, we need to express it in words. That’s the principle Paul taught in 1^st Corinthians:

For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.
1 Corinthians 2:11

Just as the Spirit of God reveals the truth about God to us through the written Word of God, so we reveal the truth about our innermost thoughts only through the words we use, whether written or spoken. At this moment you are reading my thoughts, given form through words, first typed onto a screen and now printed on a page.

How do people see what motivates us? How can they find out what our calling is, what it is that compels us in life? How can they discern the reasons why we keep certain people close to us but keep others at a distance? It will be through our words

On at least two occasions, Jesus spoke of the heart being revealed by use of the mouth. On both occasions, it is presented in a negative light:

O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.
Matthew 12:34

But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man.
Matthew 15:18

However, it is also true in a positive sense. Take, for example, Paul’s description of how we receive salvation:

That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
Romans 10:9-10

Whether they are used in praise, in testimony, or in sharing God’s Word, when the Lord is our prime motivation in life, our words will be filled with references to Him. He will become the main subject of our conversations, and His Word will fill our speech.

So what motivates you most?

What inspires your calling, drives your compulsions, shapes your choice of companions, and fills your conversations?

Whatever, or whoever, that is , it is either God or a god to us.

If God really is God of our lives, our ultimate motivation will be His glory. Everything else will be relegated as secondary in comparison.