The Pursuit of Godly Goals

Who knows, maybe he would have been 1 of the 12, you know, maybe he could have been there at Pentecost. Who knows, you know, what else we could have heard of him. Maybe we would have epistles, letters from him to churches. 

The gospel of the young rich man. 

Yeah, he would have a name. 

Ladies and gents, welcome to Voices of Life, a deep podcast with topics related to the apostolic faith in the 21st century. Let's talk about what interests you here on Voices of Life. 

Hello and welcome back to the Voices of Life. In this episode we will deal with an interesting question again and that is what kind of things should we strive for or what goals should we have in our lives because all of us have a future in our head or some ideas for our future or things that we would like to achieve or to have someday maybe in our life. So, the question is of course, what of those things are good to have as a goal or not. And for us as Christians, as born-again Christians, it's of course important to see what the Bible says about this topic. So to open this episode, I would like to go to Colossians 3, verse 2. 

And there we read, "...set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth." So, we clearly see that the Bible is giving us some direction here, and it's saying, in some way, telling us to strive for things above and not for things below on earth. But of course the question arises, what exactly does that mean? What are things above? And so I want to put that question to the round to start off. 

Amen. Basically I would say we have to be careful where our focus is. If our focus is only on earthly things, then we only accomplish earthly things and things that will pass away. But the things above, those are the heavenly things, those are the things that God wants us to do. And they are of eternal value, actually. 

And things that are from above are in the will of God. So we need to find out what the will of God is. And that's easily done by searching the Bible, reading the Bible, because the Bible is the will of God written down for us today. And of course going into prayer and God will also reveal to us what He wants us to do and what goals we should strive for, and He will help us. But basically, the things that are in the interest of God, or the most actually interest of God, is that we will be with Him in eternity. 

So, all we do in our life here on Earth is we prepare ourselves for eternity because that is what matters most. All the things that we can accomplish here on Earth, they will pass away 1 day. But if we make it to heaven and if we have won some souls that go with us to heaven, then this is a lot more worth than having big houses and other things. So when we consider the things of this earth, it's usually material things such as, maybe brother Stephen will continue. 

Yes, for example a big house, a pool, a dog, a family, an airplane, a boat. No, it's usually we don't go to the boat, but houses, that's a pretty common goal, I think, especially in Germany, since we're airing from Germany. I think it's a pretty common goal to have a house and a family. Maybe that changed today. I don't know. 

I still think that's a good goal to have. 

But it's not an easy goal to reach anymore, Considering the prices and so on and the interest rates. 

That is right. But like you said and mentioned, that it's good and noble and important to focus on that heavenly and eternal goals, which doesn't mean or exclude that we should have goals here on this earth as well. Because if we don't have earthly goals, as we would call them now, our lives will just be goalless. Just whatever, well, doesn't matter where we live, doesn't matter what we do, Doesn't matter if we keep on living here or not, whatever. I think it would be a miserable life. 

If I think about that now, having no goals here on earth whatsoever, I think that would be pretty miserable. But those goals should never be higher than the eternal goals and the spiritual goals to have. So it's not bad to have the desire to get a house, but It can never exceed the desire to please God. For example, okay, for a good house, like we just said, you have to have a job, a job that is, well, hopefully well-paid, that you can afford a house. But if having a good job excludes you from going to church and doing the will of God. 

This goal of having a house is a goal that is not reachable for you at the moment, or maybe will never be reachable. And you can never say, well, as soon as I have the house, I will serve God wholeheartedly. As soon as I have, let's say, a car, then I will give myself completely to God. 

We just talked in our German episode about a person that I talked to, And that person said, well, I will do career, earn a lot of money, and pursue my goals, financial goals, and so on. And then when I'm maybe even rich or so, it's not just that I can afford myself houses and whatever I need, but I also will have a lot more money to give to the work of God and to support his kingdom. And that goal seems noble and seems great, but the reality will be that the devil will deceive you, he will trick you, and he will see to it that you may reach your financial goals, but you won't have time for God anymore. And he will make sure that you are involved in all other activities, but not in the right thing. So we need to have priorities and the first priority is God. 

Another thing I just wanted to mention when you said it's not wrong to have earthly desires and goals like houses and so on, and absolutely it's not wrong. We only need to be careful that we don't tie our personal happiness to those goals or material things. If you're only striving for happiness and fulfillment, And we only think we can get that by accumulating money or accumulating experiences like traveling all over the world and I have to see this country and then next month I have to go to this another country for 5 months and so on and so forth. And I want more and more experiences, but well, I'm not really attending a church, I really don't have a pastor in my life anymore, and so on. Those ambitions, then they are dangerous for your spiritual health. 

I guess I jumped a little bit. I'm sorry. Is there anything 

you want to add? No, it's okay. And those things that you said are actually exactly the things on earth that we read in Colossians about, that you could want for. And sometimes those things are in competition with the things of God. And then we cannot, I mean, then we have to decide, do we want to do the will of God and have His ways in our life, or do we want our own ways and whatever we think will make us happy, but isn't good for us in the end, spiritually at least. 

Yeah, but then we can find ourselves in the position where we try to, how do you say that, there's a word but I don't have it right now, but basically just try to convince yourself that it is the will of God. We already talked about that. 

Oh, you deceive yourself and fool yourself. 

Yeah, I mean, that's exactly what the young person did when he or she, I don't know, said, well, I will do this now and then I can concentrate on the Lord and be there for the poor and so on. Yeah, so we have to be careful there. 

I think a good sentence that fits there is, it's almost like a mantra already. It's just follow your heart. Just do what you feel is right. Just do whatever comes to your mind, whatever you feel like doing. That's where, if it's the universe or something else, that's where it leads you, because it puts that into your heart. 

But the Bible tells us that the heart is deceitful above all things. And like you said, Pastor, we can deceive ourselves and tell us, yeah, if I just reach that and find happiness in that, then everything will be fine. But that's where the heart leads us, and you said in our German episode as well that it's not only God that opens doors but it's also the enemy that can make ways and open doors and create opportunities that seem like a good thing at first or as a noble goal but then in the end they are not that noble anymore, but they just fed your pride or your desire for power or influence. 

Most of the time I think the pursuit for happiness is a fleshly goal, a karma goal. And that is dangerous if we are just pursuing our wishes, our dreams, our desires, and that's all we are doing. We want to be fulfilled, self-fulfilled and so on. And we talked about in our German episode about the first Christians, you know, those disciples, those apostles, those first Christians in Rome or in Jerusalem, they were persecuted. Their life was not a fulfilled life all the time. 

They were not happy all the time. I do think they had some moments of happiness, of course, but if it's your goal to have a happy, satisfied life, then you will be disappointed sometimes, even as a Christian, Because it is not God's desire to make you happy all the time, so you feel happy. And today a lot of people just want to go according to their feelings. I feel this way, I feel that way, and that's why I'm doing this, and that's why I'm doing that. But that's not the case for us as a child of God. 

We do what is right and even though it doesn't feel good sometimes. Like we said in our all German episodes, sometimes we go to church even though we don't feel like going to church. Sometimes we worship God and we don't feel like worshiping Him. Sometimes we sing to God even though we don't like singing, because we don't feel good, but we know it is the right thing to do. So feelings don't matter. 

It's more important to do the right thing. And God sees it and God will bless it. Eventually you won't be a miserable Christian all the time. And I don't think we have to become poor, we have to live on the streets, or we have to live just above poverty line, and that's it. So I don't think that's the will of God. 

You know, God is our heavenly Father, and our Father wants us to also enjoy ourselves, But we do have to understand it's not our main objective to be happy all the time. 

That's right. We also talked about that a little bit, that there are people, or let's say denominations, that taught that before, that you have to just say no to any earthly desire that you could ever have. Even go as far as a monastery to lock yourself up and be separate from the world, be separate from anything that has to do with the world. And that is also obviously not the will of God. And so far that he says, go out into the world, you are in the world, but not be no part of the world anymore. 

So locking yourself up from any, I mean, that sounds a little bad, but earthly pleasures, if you would take it that far, like just enjoying yourself sometimes and not suffering the whole time and being by yourself and just around others that suffer the same. Oh, life is just hard and rough. And oh yes, we'll have that glorious day 1 day, when we have the rapture and we'll be in heaven with Jesus forever. But that doesn't mean, like you said, that we have to be miserable here on earth our whole life and just 

be sad. Sometimes God blesses us with things that are not necessarily important for us, for our spiritual growth. It's just to make us happy sometimes, like parents do with kids when they give them some toys. Some toys are useful, so young kids can learn something, but some toys are just there to play and have fun, and they have no big purpose behind it. And then sometimes there are certain toys that kids can only get when they reach a certain age. 

So it's the same for us. Sometimes the things that we want now, God says, no, you are not right for it right now. You are not prepared for it. I mean, you need to mature more or whatever, and then you get it, and then you know how to deal with it, and you will be happy. And even if I would take that toy away from you, you will still serve me. 

But you also have to think about, sometimes God blesses us, but what is if God just says, okay, that was a blessing for a certain amount of time, and now I take it away from you. Can we still serve God? So if we tie everything, our happiness, like I said, to those other things, to our enjoyment and whatever, then we will be sad and we will turn away from God. 

And I think we have a great example for that in Job. Mm-hmm. Okay, Kieser Basser, I 

was just about to say that. So, I was also instantly reminded by Job, because he says those words, you can give and you can give away. God can do that, because that's who He is. And I think Job is also a good example in general for this episode, because he was a man who owned a lot of things. He was rich, you know, he had those earthly treasures. 

So, we see it's not something that you are in general forbidden to have, or that will never happen in the life of a Christian, that someone is very blessed materially. But we see that his heart was right. His heart really was on the things above and not on the things on this earth or below. And like seeking to, you know, get them and then being desperate and angry at God when they get taken away, like Pastor Sascha said, that sometimes you lose things again. So I think that's a very interesting thought as well to think. 

And I think there are 2 extreme views in the religious world. We heard 1 view where people say, when we go to a monastery we don't have anything that is pleasurable. And then you have the prosperity gospel, where people say, well, if you're really a follower of God, then it shows by your blessings and whatever you have, you know, your houses, your boats, your private jets and so on, because as a pastor, you need a private jet. 

It's so crazy. 

Yeah, because You cannot be in a tube full of demons and travel with them. You have to have your own private jet. So anyway, we have those 2 extreme views, but it's not the way, of course. Our God is also a God of reason and balance also. Yeah, those are the 2 views that are crazy and that are totally opposite. 

But we need to understand, like I think it was Paul, but I don't know the Bible verse right now, when he said, you know, I can be satisfied with much, 

I can 

also be satisfied with less, I can be hungry or I'm not hungry, and everything is okay for him, basically. That's just my words. And that is spiritual maturity. 

Yeah. And this again shows that the priorities were right in first place. What we said in the beginning, that it doesn't mean that we cannot want anything on earth. And what we read in Colossians, it just means above everything, it has to matter to us what God wants. We also quoted in the German episode there, the verse in Matthew where it says, seek ye first the kingdom of God And all these other things will be added unto you. 

Yeah, priority. 

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. Yeah, no. 

No, I mean, I was done, yeah. So that's really where you see it. If you had those priorities right, then you are okay also when things go away again. 

Yeah. And we also have an example where these priorities were not right. Just came to my mind is the rich young man that came to Jesus. He said, here, and he asked him, Dear Master, dear, what do I have to do to be saved?" He's like, here, do this, keep this commandment, honor your father and mother. And he was—he came proud, and he was like, I did all this. 

Well, awesome. But I think you preached about that once, And I thought it was so profound when he said, but he must have known that there was something missing, because otherwise he would not have come like that to Jesus. And well, yeah, there was something missing, and Jesus said, well, just sell everything you got and follow after me. So he gave him the same calling. He gave to Peter, he gave to Andrew, he gave to John, come follow me, he gave to Matthew, who was also a rich person. 

Now he's the different spectrum again. But this young man, He walked away sad because he could not give up these riches, and that's exactly the priorities that went wrong. He had the money, he had probably the fame, because if he was such a young person, and he was probably known in some way with all that money. And then he walked away sad because he could not give it up for the kingdom of God. What you said, seek first the kingdom of God. 

He wanted to somehow, but he tried to put it both together. Oh, I want my riches. I want what my heart desires. I want the security. But I also want to follow Jesus. 

And that's sometimes what just can't go hand in hand. 

Yeah, the Bible also says it's very hard for rich men to enter the kingdom of God. 

But it's not impossible. 

It's not impossible, yes. We don't have to be poor Christians. We can also become wealthy, it's not a problem. But usually when people become rich, they get used to a certain lifestyle. And it's a lifestyle that they like. 

I know money can't buy you happiness, I understand that, but nevertheless, you can afford a lot of experiences that make you happy, though, when you have a lot of money. And when you become addicted to it, then you don't want to lose your money anymore and you will do everything you can to keep that money. And if that means you have no time for Sundays to go to church because you have to go outside somewhere to the golf club and get connected with other people, do some network parties and whatever, just to keep your money or even get more money, because you like the lifestyle that this money affords you, then you have a problem, then you may lose your salvation. And I think that's 1 of the reasons why it's harder for a rich person to enter into the kingdom of God. But like you said, it is not impossible. 

Yes. 

That's right. 

I thought it was so tragic when you said that he basically wanted to, but because of those riches, what you also said then, Pastor Sascha, because of this lifestyle that he couldn't leave behind or didn't want to separate himself from, he missed out on it and he did not become a disciple. I heard a message once and it said, who knows, maybe he would have been 1 of the 12, you know, maybe he could have been there at Pentecost. Who knows what else we could have heard of him. Maybe we would have epistles, letters from him to churches. 

The gospel of the young rich man. 

Yeah, he would have a name. He would have a name. Yeah, and so it's really sad and I think that teaches us how important it is when we have goals for things that we want, that we don't get too caught up by it, that we don't fall so much in love with the idea of being here or there, that then when it comes to the point where we have to decide, do I take this way or do I sacrifice it and follow God and are able to serve God the way I am supposed to serve Him, that we are then able to make the right decision. Because if we always thought about it and imagined it and fell so much in love with the idea of having something that we are not able to kill it. When it needs to be killed, then we have a big problem. 

So we have to watch out there. 

And I also think that not every goal that a human being can pursue is, how would I say, evil. Sometimes it's not good for you, but it's good for somebody else. Just another Bible verse and then I'll explain it a little better. Romans 12, 16, it says, Be of the same mind 1 towards another, and then mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate, be not wise in your own conceits." So we talked about a lot of material things, besides the experiences of course, But also sometimes we can have the goal to pursue knowledge. And not just to gain knowledge to help others, but also for ourselves to feel higher or above other people. 

And for example, in my case, I struggled for years, I've been struggling, that I have not pursued an academic career. I'm not talking about the medical career that I wanted to pursue in the beginning, but I'm talking about later on studying in Bible colleges, universities, and get degrees like bachelor's, master's, and hopefully, actually, PhD. That was my main goal to get 1 day to have a PhD, to have on my nameplate written Dr. Sascha Wey. And I wanted to have this, but the wrong motives. 

It's not just that I wanted to have knowledge to help other people and become a better teacher or so. It really, I think I would have become very proud if that would have happened. So that's why I'm not pursuing an academic title anymore. I'm still studying and doing research and so on, but I'm not doing it for the title. So the title is not a problem. 

There are other preachers and teachers that do have their doctorate degree or their PhD and so on and it's useful and it's not a problem at all and it helps them and they don't have to fight pride or whatever, but in my case this would have become a very problematic thing. It's not like I want to have a title or position of power, but this title would have made me very proud. And then I would be above average because I have that title. So I pursue those high things instead of being on the same level with everybody else and trying to minister to them in a proper way. So that's why when we have goals, the goals might not be bad goals, but if the motives are not right, then the goal is not worth pursuing. 

Yeah, and we said earlier, in the German episode I said, That's a big red flag whenever you have the feeling that, oh, pursuing this goal or achieving this makes me feel so good about myself in a way or proud in a way or whatever. When something like that is the case, you know, don't pursue this goal. Don't go after it. Who knows, maybe someday there is a time for it, but then it's definitely not the time for you to try to achieve anything of it because we read in the Bible that Pride comes before the fall and God resists, thank you, the prideful people. So you actually will end up separated and far gone away in darkness from God. 

Far away from God in darkness. If you get prideful because of some achievement that you made, so it's not worth it, whatever it is, whether it's a doctor or something else. 

Your degree is not worth to lose your soul. And spend eternity in hell, basically. 

That's right. 

I mean, so I guess we don't want to end on this negative note. Is there anything else positive you want 

to add? Well, That was a surprise attack on me. It is sometimes confusing when you record a German episode and then you talk about things and then in English and at the end you wonder, have we talked about this yet? What did we not mention yet from the things we have said before. 

1 thing I remember. That's actually a positive note, because we talked about high things and what men see as big and great things, in comparison to what God sees as a great thing, And what came to mind was the verse where it says that all heaven rejoices when 1 sinner repents. And great things in the eyes of men. And I liked the comparison that you made, Pastor, when you said, Well, when we hear about 10,000 people receiving the Holy Ghost, everybody's shouting and, wow, that's amazing! But when 1 person is saved, all of heaven already rejoices, because the price of a soul or the worth of a soul is immeasurable. 

So, even if—that already sounds strange— but even if it's just 1 soul that we save because of a decision we made or a decision we made not to do something else, That's already so precious and so much more worth than anything we could accomplish or accumulate on this earth. 

They are throwing a party, they are celebrating it, the whole heaven. And I think that's a beautiful end, because that's where we started. We said we want to go after, or how King James Version puts it, have our affection on things above. So, above they celebrate when the sinner comes and is reconciled with God. And so I think that's a beautiful ending right here to say, yeah, this is the kind of thing that we want to see. 

We want to see people being reconciled, being reunited again with their Creator, with Jesus Christ. And so, yeah, I think we are at the end for today. Yeah, yeah. Sounds good. Okay, everyone agrees. 

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