What brings you life?
I enjoy coffee. A good workout or run. Most any book. A great TV show or film, especially if it’s sci-fi. I could list many more activities that bring me life.
What do you notice about the direction of what I’ve listed above? The activities I’ve listed all move in the same direction, from outside me toward me. In other words, they are self-focused. That’s because the question “what brings you life?” is quite self-focused, isn’t it?
I could have listed other activities that are not so self-focused. I enjoy time with my family and friends. I enjoy many aspects of pastoral ministry, and especially time with people and sermon discussion. I enjoy blogging. These all bring me life.
My point is that we humans tend to have a mixture of focus on self and others, all of which can bring us life.
So let’s reflect a bit more on self-focus that is inherent in the question “What brings you life?” In pointing out that self-focus, I am not suggesting that self-focus is always wrong. There is a proper, healthy, biblical self-focus. However, observers have pointed out, rightly I think, that American culture, including our understanding of Christian discipleship, can be overly self-focused, individualistic, personal.
That’s why I am looking forward to the blog post this coming week. Kirk Marks will be continuing the blog series, Relationships in the Church, this coming week taking a look at what the Bible says about “Speaking Life to One Another.” Notice the direction of that title. It’s the opposite direction of the question, “What brings you life?” When we think about the act of speaking life to another, we are moving in the direction from ourselves to the other. So how do we speak life to one another? We’ll get started this coming Monday.
Engaging Scripture 