Oct 18, 2017
Goals. Some people love them, while others hate them. Some avoid them like the plague. But for the apostle Paul, he had one simple goal: To please God. Gone were the days of ladder-climbing and resume-building. He had no one to impress. He had no earthly achievements to pursue or temporal objectives to reach. For him, it was all about living his life in order to please the one who had called him. That’s why he could say that, whether he was dead or alive, his sole ambition was to please God. Today, as we look at 2 Corinthians 5:1-10, we want to get a glimpse into this single-minded outlook of Paul. It isn’t that he was against achieving anything in this life. It was that he had a long-term perspective that focused on the hereafter far more than the here-and-now. Yes, he was busy sharing the gospel and traveling near and far to make it happen, but he wasn’t out to be the best evangelist on the planet. He could care less whether he made a name for himself or got a lot of credit for all he had done. He knew there was only one person’s opinion that mattered when it came to whether he had done a good job. And that was God. Paul saw life on this planet as temporary. He was headed somewhere much better. But he was going make the most of his days here on earth. All so he could one day stand before His maker and hear him say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”