Walking in the Flow

by Tom Johnston

What moves you? I mean, really moves you? Not just emotively, but motivationally – what moves you to action? Is it a situation – a positive or negative experience, or perhaps circumstances – those that are pleasant, or those that are uncomfortable and challenging? Is it personal need, a sense of mission, a desire to please, an aspiration to show love? Is it a feeling, a way of thinking, a perspective; is it hope, or fear, or anger, or joy, or lust, or greed, or ambition? Could it be a desire to bring change, a just cause, a passion to see people helped and served; a wish for people to know the truth – as you see it; a passion for souls “won to Christ?” It is something you choose, or simply a “knee-jerk” reaction to some external stimulus in your life, good or bad? What is it; what drives you? It may be one of these things, or something similar. The point is, something does motivate you, and something does move you. The question is: what is the ultimate source of that motivation; that drive, that passion?

When you look at the list above, you view it through a framework within your thinking and emotions which reflects your moral values and ethical beliefs. This framework is developed through experience and learning, what you have been taught and what you have encountered in life; through your upbringing, family life, the country and locality you were born into, as well as your place within the socio-economic and ethnic status of your culture. Of the list above, you may see some as almost angelic in virtue or demonic in expression; and you would be right, to a point. What drives us proceeds from within – for good or for ill, from our own heart. Because of this we are admonished in Proverbs 4:23 to:

Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.

Jesus highlights this in Luke 6:45:

The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.

The rabbis of His day thought of the “good intention” and the “evil intention” of the human heart, and the struggle was to master the evil intention and thereby give rise to the good. We see this in the story with Cain and Abel in Genesis 4:6-7:

The Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.”

Unlike Taoism (Daoism), which seeks to hold these forces in the Yin-Yang balance, the Hebraic rabbi sought to teach his disciples to overcome the “evil intention.” The problem is – we can’t do either. We cannot achieve the balance the Taoist would desire, nor can we ourselves master the “evil intention” of sin as described by the rabbis. Cain couldn’t do it, David couldn’t do it and we can’t do it. Yet, the desire to do good is there because we are made in the Imago Dei, but that image is marred by sin. So, from this we can see that all human motivation in and of itself is, to some degree, corrupted. It is the self-oriented nature of the fallen human condition that taints the purest desire, with the self being both the source and the object of the motivation – what I do, I do because of me, and I do for me. After all, it really is all about me! Beyond the rare selfless heroism, we are bound to the problem of the self. What I do, I most often do for the sake of self, very often even loving and serving myself so as to be loved and accepted by others. Many are driven to preach the Gospel not out of compassion, but out of a need to be superior, to be right. Many want their ministry to prosper not for the satisfaction of Christ’s travail (Isaiah 53:11), but for their own need for success. Many even seek to serve God through “soul winning,” hoping in actuality to win the love and approval of their heavenly Father.

This is the problem Paul talks about in his Letter to the Romans, in chapters 6 through 8, the death of the self in favor of the life of Christ living in us and flowing through us, being the only solution. We can’t overcome the evil intention of the fallen nature, but we can die to it. We can live, not just in the “good intention,” but rather in the goodness of the person of Christ. Regrettably, we often view these chapters from a theological or theoretical perspective, rather than a practical one.

So what does it look like to actually live out this goodness of Christ through self-death? Sounds rather bleak, doesn’t it, dying to self and all? Is it all a road of pain and suffering? There is some of that, yes, self-mortification of the flesh is not comfy, not “warm and fuzzy.” But the key is found to all of this is in this passage in Romans 8:12-15:

So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”

The key is simply living life in the flow of the Spirit, and allowing all motivation to proceed from that. No longer am I living, but it is Christ who is living within me, and through me (Galatians 2:20). I no longer have to master the evil intention or try to exude goodness, two things I can’t do anyway, I just have to choose Christ over myself in all things. I no longer must master evil or good, I must be mastered by the One who is good incarnate. For many this sounds too metaphysical or ethereal, but it is actually quite practical. While the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in each disciple of Christ is a profound mystery, the daily walk of yieldedness is a simple function of relationship: the more time I spend with the Person of Christ; the more time I spend in meditating on His Scriptures; the more time I spend with Him in reflection and prayer; the more sensitive I become to His moving. So, then, as I walk through my day, I am walking in His flow, my heart and desires yielded to His.

While this time investment sounds extreme, it is more about consistency and constancy than the actual hours allotted in spiritual pursuit. If I have time with Him and His word consistently on a daily basis, and if I build into my day the means of being aware of Him continually, I will be able to draw upon His presence, His heart, His mind, His will and His desires, putting mine aside. The real death I must embrace is not just to my fleshly desires, but a death that allows me to prioritize God in my personal schedule! Again, Paul speaks to us about this as well in Colossians 4:2:

Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.

We can walk through our daily life in a God-aware posture, always seeking communion with His spirit, having an attitude of awareness or watchfulness for what the Father is doing (John 5:19). Whatever we encounter, whomever we encounter, we do so in thankfulness, responding through the Spirit, in the Spirit to everything and everyone, realizing in everything the will of the Spirit, as it says in Romans 8:28, in Paul’s culmination of His dialog about the flesh/Spirit struggle:

And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.

This should then be our goal as disciples of Jesus Christ, to walk in His Spirit daily to flow with Him in what He is doing, to be motivated by that which motivates Him and nothing else, dead to the self, but fully alive in Christ. All this is simply attained, to an ever greater degree through our relationship with Him. May this be so for you, and may you walk in the flow of the Holy Spirit daily, moved by His heart, sensitized to His directing breezes, living a life overflowing with the abundance of the Person of Jesus Christ.