Miselo shares his thought from the week; the good life.

Have you ever posed the question, “What is the good life?”. We get a lot of messages about what it looks like to have ‘the good life’. We get messages that tell us that having a good life is about having an expensive car, a big house, a big job with a lot of money to go with it, family, children, some pets and that country life. We all get different messages about what the good life looks like. For you, the good life is being healthy, being able to run and having a strong physique. That could be the good life for you. Perhaps maybe for you, it’s about dressing in the most expensive and fresh fashion that is currently in trend and that is the good life, being able to attain those things. But what is really the good life?

So on pondering this question, there are really two things for me that my mind has kind of been meditating on. One is ‘purpose’ the second one is ‘delight’. Now as Christians, our worldview is not shaped by what the world is saying so we are not conformed to the ways of the world but we are conformed to what God is saying to us. And in John 10:10, we find here Jesus telling us that the thief cometh not but to steal, to kill, and to destroy. Then he goes on to say that “I am come”, that is Jesus has come, that we may have life and have it in abundance, that is it overflows. And to me, that sounds very exciting, that sounds like the good life. But in what Jesus is saying also, we can read from there that unless we are truly, fully committed and subscribed to what the purpose of God is, we will not experience the good life.

So the good life comes from number one, following the plans and the purposes of God for our lives. That’s when we experience the joys and the freedom that comes as part of that good life, that abandoned life that Jesus is telling us about. Now I know it sounds challenging and almost in the opposite direction to your own aspirations and desires, but there is a trust element as well I think that we must have to follow Christ and follow Him in everything that he’s leading us to do.

The second thing is from Psalm 73 verses 25 and 26:

Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh, my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

Psalm 73:25-26

So this psalm is telling us that our greatest delight, our greatest joy must come from doing the things of God. The things that delight God should delight us and our greatest satisfaction should come from doing the will of God. So the two are not contrary. We’re living in the purposes and plans of God and then we are delighting in the things of God. Our joy comes from that and that is what’s going to give us the good life, the good life not just for the moment we’re here on earth but the good life that is eternal, the good life that is what I would say transgenerational it can cross over into the life in Christ beyond this earth. In the words of my favourite artist Trip Lee who did a whole album called The Good Life and he’s written a book about The Good Life too. He ends with these words

A good life is a life that’s been laid down
Meaning that the good life is a surrendered life
The good life is where we have given it all up to god
To do whatever he wills and desires in our lives
And that is the good life

Every week one of our members shares a short thought aiming to inspire you for the week. You can watch previous Thought For The Week videos by clicking here.