MOTIVATED FROM WITHIN
Allan H. Kircher
28 Sept 08
What is your motivation, your drive, your ambition to continue in the world today?
Are you crying deep within trying to seek God’s will in your life, but you just seem to continue in the ways of the world?
The drive within you determines the road you take in this forgotten world. A world plagued with crime, sex, addictions, and a world surrounded by the prince of darkness.
Your drive must be strong, but it must be the drive of the Spirit within you.
Various approaches of psychology speak of various “drives”. Some talk about the sex drives as being the primary drive, while others talk about the drive for self-fulfillment.
Others speak of addictions to alcohol, tobacco, or various drugs.
Theologians often speak of the dominance of inherited (original) sin.
Behavioral therapists talk about the strength of learned behavior.
Physicians and psychiatrists talk about the influence of chemical imbalance upon people causing them to exhibit inappropriate behavior.
But God says today there is a drive, a power, a force, strength greater than any of these.
It is a power that can neutralize, even supersede any other drive. It is the power of the Spirit of God. PRAY PRAY PRAY
We first must look at Jesus and how the drive of the Spirit of God was used in his life.
Matthew describes Jesus as being “Led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil” (Matthew 4:1).
However, Mark says, “And immediately the Spirit driveth him into the wilderness” (Mark 1:12).
Jesus did not look at his own drive, ambition, or motivation. He was led by the Spirit of God.
The Spirit of God superseded the human drive.
The word description of the word “drive” is of an animal being prodded by a stick to make it go.
What drive is in your life today? What has prodded you on the road you travelled today?
When you fell into that negative attitude yesterday who was poking you to divulge you in that behavior?
There are only two drives you can take, the Spirit of God or Satan.
Jesus was to go into the wilderness that would be extremely hot in the day and cold at night. It would be barren.
In the wilderness Jesus would be alone for forty days. There would be wild animals that would seek his life. He would eat no food or drink no water during his stay.
He would also be tempted by the strongest tempter, the devil. What do you think his mind and body were telling him?
From the human side, his body must have said, “ I don’t want to go without food and water, especially for forty days.”
His emotions must have said, “I don’t feel like going through this all alone.” His intellect must have said, “There has to be another way.” His will must have argued, “I don’t think I can handle this.”
In our everyday lives don’t we do the same things?
How many times has the Pastor preached up here about our mind, will, and emotion?
When we face the trails of life our emotions say, “I have a legitimate accuse to argue this point.” Or our intellect tells us “I can just ask for forgiveness if I explode in anger.”
Or our will argues with us and tells us it’s ok were human “you’re going to sin.”
This is the drive of your will and if you get sucked into that you will deteriorate in the Spirit of God.
This is why you need to tap into God’s grace to supersede these actions and thoughts.
Gal 5:16-17 So I say live by the Spirit, and do not gratify the desires of the sinful nature, for the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit and the Spirit is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other and you do not do what you want.
You see, you have a choice, are you giving into the sinful nature or are you motivating the Spirit of God?
Be on guard to enable the right drive. Be on guard to motivate the right drive. You are either going to motivate the sinful nature or the Spirit of God in every situation in your life.
The more you motivate, enable and act on the Spirit of God the more the Spirit suppresses the sinful nature.
How then was Jesus able to walk through this experience and come out victorious? What drove Him? It was the Spirit of God in Him.
His desire to seek his Father’s will drove him in the Spirit.
Your desire must be to seek the Spirit of God in all things.
The more you enable the Spirit of God in your life the easier the suppression of the sinful nature becomes.
This is the very reason you should not see a seasoned Christian gossiping or arguing.
Because the seasoned Christian reads the word of God, memorize, meditates, prays, seeks fellowship.
And when the opportunity comes, and it will, to fall into the sinful nature, they motivate themselves within to seek direction from God.
Rom 8:5-6 says “Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires. Those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.”
Does the Spirit desire to be idle for the supremacy of God? Does the Spirit desire to gossip or talk maliciously?
The Spirit is not motivated by these desires but the desires of the word of God. Are you motivated to seek the Spirit that lives in you?
Now lets honestly look back this past week
Lets’ use a general scenario a person who works. And gets home around 5:30 eat dinner, talk with the family and settles in let’s say 7:00 Pm. And goes to bed at 11:00.
That’s 4 hours of free time for each night. Take away Sunday night and Wednesday night and you have 20 hours a week of free time.
Is the Spirit of God lying dormant in you today by you not using that time each day?
This does not even count the morning devotion time.
You have to be motivated to know that TV show is not going to enhance your drive in the Spirit of God.
Think of the immense knowledge you would have in reading God’s word for have that 20 hours.
What is your drive today?
You see, if I’m driven in motivation of the Spirit of God, I’m seeking His will in my shell.
My motivation is built upon striving to seek His honor.
When you come upon a situation you should instantaneously should have a flashing red light come upon you to go to the sinful nature or the Spirit.
When that comes do you take caution and motivate the Spirit within you?
The great news is, overtime and obedience and motivation that flashing red light becomes a flashing yellow light then the Spirit of God lay upon your soul so heavily that you become placed on cruise control heading down the path of the Spirit of God in all aspects of your walk.
I guarantee I can pull out of the congregation this morning ten motivated marines. Whether you active duty, retired or reserve makes no difference.
I can place each and every one of these Marines on this pulpit and have them state verbatim the National Anthem, the pledge of Allegiance and better yet the Marine Corps Hymn. Perhaps they even still know their general orders even if they have been out for 20 years.
Your saying, well what does this have to do with the word of God? Simple. To the Marine, it is life. It is their drive to continue in honor. They ingrain this pride in their being. They memorize. They live and die for this honor. They stand faithful to their commitment to their country, for better or worse. No questions ask. Their drive is in their soul of being a United States Marine. We walk around with a gloat in our stride.
Gloating in your stride means to feel or express smug self-satisfaction about something such as an achievement.
We don’t try in the Marine Corps, “you do or you don’t” We don’t straddle any fences.
We are Marines…Semper Fi…do or die…oohrah… our drive is the motivation of being a Marine.
Do you have that dedicated smug self-satisfaction about your achievement as a child of God?
Is your drive as a disciple so fulfilling that you seek to memorize God’s word?
I can’t memorize scripture…..I’am too old to memorize scripture… seek the drive of the Spirit of God in your life. You seeked the ingraining of the spirit of the Corps…..that pride…that motivation…that brotherly love…..
Display that in your walk with your heavenly Father.
Any Marine out here this morning can recite at least 5 of their general orders…
Can you recite 5 Scripture verses….Look what God has done for you in your life….and your going to tell God you can’t memorize his word? But you can tell Him your general orders if He needs to know them.
Or sing the “Marine Corps Hymn” He already knows that too……
Sing praises to his name, the almighty creator of heaven and earth and the Marine Corps.
Now this does not single out all of you who are not Marines. Whether a housewife, car salesman, heating and air conditioning technician, your drive in the past has forced you to study, memorize, evaluate, recertify in some way to make you a better person at that job.
You see, if you don’t study God’s word, memorize, mediate, pray, you will shrivel up within yourself and your drive will begin to lead you to your own will.
Just as you eat and drink daily to continue to nourish your body to move on and continue, you must eat and drink daily the word of God to continue to walk in the light.
Don’t you feel weak and malnourished when you don’t pray and read God’s word for a period of time?
The Spirit of God needs to be enabled by your drive to continue in His ways.
Now let’s look at the Old Testament to see how the Spirit of God moved:
The Spirit of the Lord “moved” Samson at times. Judges 13:25
The Spirit of God came upon Samson and enabled him to tear apart a young lion as he would a young (goat) (Judges 14:6).
Can you imagine being that filled with the Spirit of God!
If you remember David and Benaiah in 1st and 2nd Samuel had performed similar feats.
These men of God were motivated by the drive of the Spirit of God in their life.
The Spirit of the Lord came upon David when Samuel anointed David as a young lad, then the Spirit enabled David to kill the lion and the bear and later Goliath, the giant man of war. 1 Samuel 17:47-49).
Isaiah declares that God put His Spirit within Moses and caused him to rest (Isaiah 63:14) as he led the Israelites.
Moses had been in the wilderness for forty years. He had become a shepherd. Then suddenly, God calls him to become a leader of about one million people. He was able to led the people because of the Spirit of God.
God also put the Spirit upon the seventy elders that they might judge the people along with Moses(numbers 11:17).
Moses laid his hands upon Joshua, and he was filled with the spirit of wisdom to lead the people(Deuteronomy 34:9).
God put His words in the mouth of Jeremiah and made them to be as fire that they would devour the people (Jeremiah 5:14).
Jeremiah was motivated from within—compelled to speak the words that God had given him.
“the word of the Lord came expressively unto Ezekiel…and the hand of the Lord was upon him”(Ezekiel 1:3).
Ezekiel was burdened to do what God had directed him to do.
“as he spoke, the spirit came into me and raised me to my feet and I heard him speaking to me.” (Ezekiel 2:2).
The Spirit caused Ezekiel to rise to his feet.
Have you ever made a commitment to go to church and turn right around and stay at home?
Commitment and willpower will only take one just so far.
We need the Spirit to “drive” us to do what God would have us to do.
The spirit of God wants us to attend church on Sunday and Wednesday night.
The spirit of God wants us to yearn to read the bible at night and not only read but be excited to probe into his word.
You need to be motivated to do these things in the same way you look forward to seeing that particular tv show on Tuesday or Thursday night.
You see that TV show will just make you delve into the sinful nature—consciously or subconsciously.
The Spirit of God should have us thirsty to have devotion in the morning before we enter into the world.
The motivation and the Spirit of God should have us memorizing and detailing scripture to use in our daily lives.
The spirit of God will motivate you beyond control.
But you must enable the power of God through your very being.
Peter explained, “For Prophecy never had it’s origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” (II Peter 1:21).
The prophets didn’t just get up one day and say, “I think that I will prophecy for God today.”
We should see that the men of God were driven by the power of God.
We have to let go of self and allow the Spirit of God to carry us along in the direction that He desires for us to move.
How many times have we heard the Pastor tell us that we have to work in the gifts of the Spirit?
Are you working in your gift of the Spirit? Empower that Spirit in your life.
We need to place our motives in the right direction. On the right road. Our motive comes from either ourselves or God.
When you’re on God’s path and direction there is no need for a navigation system. You will never get lost or have to ask for directions. You will not have strife and bitterness, resentment, backsliding for God’s way does not direct you in this path.
God will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will expose the motives of men’s heart. 1 Cor 4:5
Do you have integrity in your devotion to God? When we Marines were in the Corp we had impeccable integrity for the Corp.
Now that you are a Christian, do you have that same integrity for the beauty of God?
That same value? That same love?
We walked with the motivation and integrity that if anyone would say anything negative towards our country or Corp that we immediately got hiper in defense of our identity in the Corp.
Today, are you motivated when someone uses inappropriate language around you in defense of our ever loving God.
Do you defend God Monday through Saturday in your work space. Do you gloat around with the Spirit of the Lord in your heart?
Are you truly motivated by the Spirit of the Lord in your heart? It’s time to get excited about our Savior.
Excited and motivated of the freedom we possess from the blood of Jesus Christ.
God’s spirit will change you…….
If you were an alcoholic, a thief, an abuser, a liar, a drug abuser, a worrier, God has cleansed you from all that and you now must show your true motivation, a motivation that comes from within.
The motivation driven from the power of God.
Some folks have been members at many churches in Beaufort.
You see they join the church, and at first they are involved, zealous, active, they participate.
Then when their zeal begins to diminish, they move on to another church. Often you’ll hear them say, “I just wasn’t motivated over there anymore!”
Some people don’t look for their motivation from within, they look everywhere else!
They make others to make them do what they should want to do on their own!
But somewhere, sometime, we need to ask the question, “Can’t I do what God wants me to do even if I’m not surrounded by zealous people?”
Come alive in the presence of the Almighty God within you.
You see, our view of motivation sometimes places all the responsibility on someone else!
Stir up the gift of God, which is in thee….
Noah was surrounded by unbelievers, mockers and all manner of sinners.
His environment gave him no encouragement or motivation, but he did what God said do!
Jeremiah, Daniel, John the Baptist, they didn’t have motivational seminars!
But they obeyed God and did they were supposed to do!
You can do what’s right even if there is little or no motivation.
It would be nice to have perfect Deacon’s, Sunday School teachers, a preacher of all men, a congregation with a 100% participation. But this is the earth, not heaven.
We can do what God says to do here on earth in less than perfect circumstances.
Our motivation and drive our integrity must come from God’s holy word.
Where do we get the motivation within us? How can we motivate the Spirit within us?
You plead with your heavenly Father to deliver you from the bondage of timidity.
From the bondage of getting up in the morning with just enough time to get ready for work and not reading God’s word.
From the bondage of the habit of sitting in the recliner for hours upon hours watching secular TV.
From the bondage of covetetousness of doing other things instead of coming to church on Wednesday and Sunday nights.
You plead with your Heavenly Father to deliver you from the sights of the world that blind you from the Spirit of God.
Experience the vision that God has in store for you.
The vision of His word. The vision of His name. the vision of His Spirit.
Experience the power of His word.
The power of His name. The power of His ways. The Power of His Spirit.
Experience the love of God by motivating the Spirit within you.
The Marine Corps says, “ The Few The Proud The Marines”
Let us say as Christians today, “the few, the proud, the disciples.”
The Marines say, “The first to go in, the last to leave.”
Let us say as Christians today, “the first to witness, and the last to forsake”
Let us get motivated and excited by just thinking of our Savior.
How can we motivate the Spirit of God to work within us?
The Power of the Holy Spirit is offered to every believer, beginning on Day of Pentecost.
Jesus offered the rebirth by the Spirit on the day of his resurrection. (John 20:21-22).
The primary requirement for the Believer to receive this power of the Holy Spirit is to ASK. (Luke 11:13).
This is not a lighthearted asking but an asking out of a necessity to have the power to live the Christian life.
It is a continual asking with a determination to receive that power.
We also should understand the awesomeness of the power of the Holy Spirit.
The power of the Holy Spirit is the same power that raised Jesus from the dead.
God’s word tells us in Rom 8:11, “And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.
Isn’t that awesome….did you know that?
We should understand that the power is invested within Believers enabling them to do the will of God.
Are you using that power in your life? Are you enabling that power in your life?
We are to depend upon this power when we find ourselves weak. 2 Cor 12:9-10 says, “My Grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
Do you depend on his power when you are weak? When you are frustrated? When you are weary?
We are not to lay this power upon the shelf or neglect it.
We are to motivate and enable and utilize the power that God has given us to live the Christian life.
Last, we are to stir up this power within us. Let us motivate ourselves within to seek the power within.
Don’t let that Spirit sit dormant in your soul.
Paul says in 2 timothy 1:6 to fan the flame of the gift of God.
Will you fan that flame? Will you motivate yourself to fan that flame?
