fighting with purpose

Let’s be honest, when it comes to the end of the year most of us franticly put together a list of new year’s resolutions. We write them at the front of our dairies, put them up on the fridge on our dream boards. At eye level where they can be seen every day, so they are never out of sight.

On the 1st of January this year I found myself writing down not new year’s resolutions but eight goals, or really eight ways I wanted to live my life this year.

1. More rhythms, less resolutions.
2. More reading, less scrolling
3. More social, less media
4. More celebration, less comparison
5. More prayer, less grumbling
6. More rejoicing, less reminiscing  
7. More moments, less stuff 
8. More purpose, less deadlines

Then COVID19 hit, nobody could predict the year of 2020 would be the year of a global pandemic. With people crazily buying toilet paper like it was lined with gold or packet cake mixes flying off the shelves, like parents were planning to include the activity of baking a cake as a science experiment with the kids while home schooling. But in all seriousness, COVID19 crept into 2020 and rained down havoc and caused panic and isolation for so many.

I reflect back on the 1st of January and look through these goals, they aren’t just goals but a way of life I decided I wanted to establish within my life and within my family. COVID19 or not, my mantra was Always more ! Ephesians 3:20 says, “Now to him, who is able to do more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us”… Through Christ, there is always more. I am committed to MORE and this is what I wanted MORE of…

 More rhythms. More reading. More social. More celebration. More prayer. More rejoicing. More moments and More purpose.

I have to say, More purpose and less deadlines leaped off the page and dropped into my spirit as I was writing it down. Now I’m not saying I’ve aced every other one and I have them sorted, but if I’m not careful and intentional often times the business of “doing life” creeps in and before I know it, it carries me away. God really spoke to me about this one, as I feel if I truely navigate this then there will be an incredible ease with the others and there will be more purpose.

I often hear people say that finding purpose is easy just flourish where you’re planted, but it can actually be really difficult, it can actually be a fight when you find yourself in an unexpected and unknown territory. In times when there is what seems to be no control and a lack of purpose. A shift in perspective is actually what’s needed, easier said than done! Right? but in situations that seem dark and so beyond us we need to remember that we haven’t been buried, we have actually been planted.

 Take a wildflower for example they grow under intense conditions, and most of the time even without being deliberately grown. Wildflowers are simple and unpretentious they’re seemingly weak but secretly resilient they are able to weather and withstand the temperature of life.

There is really none that compares! If you were to compare a wildflower the differences, the colour, the tones and shapes. Now you don’t see them comparing with each other, wildflowers don’t look at each other and compare how they came to be planted. They don’t look at which weed their neighbour sprung from or how they managed to get so tall do they? And why would they!

 You know to compare means to examine or look for the difference between two things... it’s a verb, a doing word. Meaning to actively look for the difference, to actively look for the positives and negatives.

 Now don’t get me wrong comparison can be very motivating, but most of the time especially in our day and age comparison makes us miserable. We are so good at comparing, aren’t we? Aren’t we? (or is it just me). Comparing purpose up against someone else’s purpose is crazy, it’s actually incomparable full stop!!

 We place such an emphasis on discovering and comparing our purpose that we actually miss what is happening right in front of us, which is likely our purpose for the season we are in and right where we are. We stop flourishing, we stop fighting with purpose because we are too concerned about where we should/could be and about where others are. I don’t care what anyone says, but that is the true thief of joy

While I was mulling over this goal of fighting for purpose I remembered a movie. Cinderella Man. James Brad-dock was a good boxer who lost his passion and purpose for fighting, so he quit the sport. When the Great Depression hit and his family slid into poverty he went back into boxing.

He made a startling and impressive comeback, fighting with passion and focus. At one point in the movie a reporter asks James, What are you fighting for?" he replied, "Milk. I'm fighting for milk for my children."

This character knew what he was fighting for. He was fighting to win, yes, but more he was fighting to be able to feed his family. We need to know why we are fighting for!

Now I’m not much of a boxer, I know for some of you that’s hard to believe but I do know what it’s like to lose passion and purpose.

I’m not sure if you are aware but there are 135 days remaining of 2020 and if we are going to FIGHT WITH PURPOSE there are a few things we need to be committed to learning or re-learning to fight well…

We need to commit to fight with wisdom
Wisdom is fighting with our head held high, wisdom is looking forward

 Have you ever seen a fight, or any competitive sport where players come on to the field with their eyes looking at their feet, their head low (well maybe the Broncos)!
NO! how do they walk on the field?
With their head held high, looking forward, looking up! Why? Because they can see where they are going, that’s wisdom.

 Wisdom is a power of vision, the power to see without attempting to fit into a one size fits all mould. Wisdom is the ability to think and act using knowledge, experience, understanding and common sense and insight. 

Look at David he was a merely a shepherd boy. David slays the Philistine giant Goliath and saves the nation of Israel. After David accepted Goliath's challenge, King Saul tried to make him look and act like a soldier. He tried to dress him in armour and give him a sword and shield.The sword was too big. The armour was too heavy. David could not even walk, let alone fight in it, so he took it off.

1 Samuel 12:40 says, "He took his shepherd's stick and then picked up five smooth stones from the stream and put them in his bag. With his sling ready, he went out to meet Goliath."

Before David went out to slay Goliath. David was given all of the things that a soldier needed to defeat his enemy. But David wasn't a soldier. He was a shepherd. He didn't fit into soldier's clothing because they simply weren't who he was.

When facing an enemy, it’s not the time to try a new technique or approach

Just perhaps, there is a lesson here that we can learn
Maybe it’s… if we want to fulfil God's purpose for our lives, then we should wear the clothes that God provides for us.

In any sport you are there to attack, to win. Commit to having that mentality the whole time. Don’t go in with the “let’s see what happens first.” That’s exactly the kind of thing that makes you second guess yourself and increases your chances of losing. There’s a difference between being smart and being cautious. It’s ok to observe and think, but COMMIT!

Staying committed causes us to fight with influence
I’ve found that when your past meets your purpose, you fight with influence. It actually doesn’t matter what season you find yourself in you will always find that something is always in your hand…

It doesn’t matter what it is, or that it’s common or that it’s old and stained because God will ALWAYS begin with what’s in your hand, even if it seems so simple and insignificant. It has less to do with what it is in your hands and everything to do with your heart position and whether you are willing and available with what you have NOW.

 Look at Moses, Moses encountered God in the burning bush, and after Moses listed off a number of reasons why he was not the one for the job, God asked him a question…
Exodus 4:2
“What is that in your hand?” “A staff,” he replied

The staff was rather common, Moses was probably confused and unsure of how it would do anything after all a staff is really just an upgraded stick, definitely not extraordinary! That is until God begins to anoint what’s in our hands.

I love that God will always use what is in our hands, whatever it is and nothing is disqualified. He will anoint what we have already been faithful to wield. He used Samson and a donkey jawbone to slay a thousand men, He used Samuel and anointing oil to proclaim a shepherd boy, He used David his sling shot and stones to slay the mighty Goliath, He used the unnamed little boy who had 5 loaves and two fishes, He used a broken daughter who had an alabaster box filled with oil to anoint Jesus.

 These 5 examples are people who simply committed to use what was in their hands and they had significant influence

 It says in Acts 4:30“Stretch out your hand to heal and perform signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”

As we release what is in our hands, He releases what’s in His. All too often we underestimate the power of fighting with Passion. When we live and breathe passion we fight with focus. it requires an active spirit to stay faithful to see whats ahead but to see what’s in your hand right here and right now. It also requires strength to not be moved by pressure of fear. Fear is something we all deal with. I battle it in my own life. Sometimes it’s small, and other times it’s huge, but through it all we can combat fear by keeping our gaze on what God is doing rather than on what we’re doing. When our eyes are fixed on God we naturally,

Commit to fighting with Focus  
Rather than worrying about getting hurt or the outcome at hand, we should be worrying about what we have to do, what God has for us to do. When you think about it, it’s really a waste of time and energy to worry about things that are out of our control. The moment we stop to worry about getting hit, that’s when we are probably going to get hit.

Acts 26:16“But rise up and stand on your feet; for this purpose I have appeared to you, to appoint you a minister and a witness not only to the things which you have seen, but also to the things in which I will appear to you.”

The cross of Christ challenges us to walk unwaveringly focussed on Jesus. God doesn’t call us to succeed; He simply asks us to say yes and I believe, every fibre to live life to the fullest with passion.