A Definite Chief Aim in God

"One thing I do ... I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus."

Philippians 3:13, 14 (KJV)

There is great power in knowing what you are aiming for. The apostle Paul, who penned the above words, was not a man who lived without purpose. There was a mark, or a goal, around which his thoughts and his actions focused.

One of the characteristics of the world we live in today is distraction. Life has become complex, and many circumstances arise which cry out for attention. Many voices come to us both through personal acquaintances, and the mass media, urging upon us this or that objective for our consideration. If we do not have a clear sense of where we are trying to go, what we are aspiring to, it is certain that we will become drifters, programmed by the world we live in to run to and fro, without ever accomplishing anything of lasting value.

This is not God's plan for the Christian. The follower of Jesus, of all people, should know what he or she is about. It is not good enough for the follower of Jesus to drift through life, without clear purpose, perhaps being content to merely "get by". It is not enough to pay off the mortgage and retire in comfort with adequate medical insurance. Jesus did not live that way, Paul did not live that way, and no one who ever made a significant difference for God did so by living that way. We must not allow ourselves through discouragement, or someone's indifference, to settle for a mediocre life of non-achievement spiced up occasionally by various entertainments we find along our path.

Many Unbelievers know the Power of a Chief Aim in Life

In this, the children of this age are wiser in their generation than the children of light. You can read books by secular psychologists and motivational speakers which make a clear case for the power of focused thinking towards a definite chief aim. The people who made their mark in the business world, the world of sports, academia, politics or in the arts did not get their without motivation and discipline. When you search it out, these people all had a burning ambition to be great in their field.

It is sad when Christians must take their inspiration from worldly leaders and philosophers. Many times there is poison mixed in with the truths these people teach, and some Christians are deceived through it. We need to be discerning about what we receive into our hearts and minds. The Bible says not to be conformed to this world. This does not mean, however, that there are not valid psychological principles related to achievement and success. The main thing to ask though is this: is the goal itself and the motivation for it something that comes out of the heart of God? If we successfully achieve the wrong goal in life, it would be like climbing a high mountain, only to find that we are on the wrong mountain. Instead of finding the glory of God there, we could find ourselves at the mouth of a raging volcano.

The Upward Call, or the High Calling in Christ Jesus

There is a high calling for each believer in Christ. Its pretty easy to walk in the "low calling" of just getting by, keeping your nose fairly clean, leaning on your justification in Christ and being a faithful church member. It is important that we do lean on our justification in Christ, because none of us has a record so perfect in ourselves that it would justify our entrance into heaven. It is also good to be faithful to a local church, provided that is the local church where God wants you to be. However, there is much more to aim for than this.

Paul was a great apostle, and had planted a number of significant churches. But he did not as yet consider himself to have apprehended yet. He had something further to aspire to. Its important that we have a goal which keeps us motivated to the end of our lives. Otherwise, we might achieve what we aimed for and then the rest of life would be an anti-climax. Even after so much fruitful and impactful living in Christ, Paul was aiming for something higher.

What is the high calling for you? You cannot know unless you first pursue the personal, intimate, experiential knowledge of God Himself. Only God can show you what the high calling is for you! And a major part of that calling, whatever it is, is to walk closely with God. There must be a continual yearning to know God better, to be close to Him, to feel the truths of the Word of God in our soul as well as our spirit and to hear His heartbeat. We are called to love God totally, and you can't achieve the higher call without that happening in your life.

There is always something more, something greater for the Christian. It need not be something ordinary natural men can see and appreciate. Your higher calling may be to pray in revivals and great awakenings around the world through intercession! You might do this while living in relative obscurity. There are different things in God, but all of us are called to something. There is a lot of hidden potential in every Christian. This must be so, for the Scripture declares concerning you, if you are truly a Christian, that "Jesus Christ lives in you" (2 Corinthians 13:5). God has given a different mix of gifts, talents and motivations to each one of us. Many of these treasures lie undiscovered and unused. There is much in you that remains to be seen!

The Right Motivation

When attempting to settle on a definite chief aim in life, there are a number of questions we should ask.

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Firstly, we should ask: is this goal for the glory of God, or for my personal glory? What is the motivation for it? Is it the seeking of personal recognition, from others or from oneself? Or is it the recognition and approval of God that interests us more? We need to be deeply honest at this point, for if there are cracks in this foundation, it will show up under pressure later in life.

The Bible says, "Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God" (1 Corinthians 10:31). This verse tells us that the motivation for the honour of God should control all our actions, even down to simple things like eating and drinking. This may seem strange, but eating and drinking iun the right way is more important than many think. One of the chief causes for the lack of power amongst Pentecostal/Charismatic Full Gospel Christians today is the love of food. As Paul said in another place, "who are enemies of the CROSS of Christ, whose god is their bellies". We eat more than is compatible with a strong prayer life, more than is possible to eat if we want to be full of the Holy Spirit. And many times, when we do eat, we eat garbage that tastes good and feels good at the time but eventually brings on heart disease, cancer and strokes. Can we truly do this to the glory of God?

So all our living should glorify God. And our thinking and purpose should also revolve around that theme, for "as a man THINKS in his heart, so is he". We are "TRANSFORMED by the renewing of our minds" (Romans 12:2), which really means the renewing of our thought life. Therefore, our definite chief aim should be for the glory of God since this chief aim will become a focal point for our thinking and personal meditation.

What keeps coming back as a recurring thought to you throughout the day? What message is coming out of your heart? Is it something that God is pleased with, or does it reflect a lack of trust in God? Is it pure, noble, just and right, or the opposite? God is very interested in us reforming our thought life. He will help us do it, but He won't do it without our co-operation and personal effort. In this, truly God has made us active players. In this, we have a fight on our hands because you will find that there is a power from the other side actively striving to fill your heart and mind with poisonous weeds, with seeds of snakes and spiders so to speak, with the polluted philosophies and priorities of this world system, which neither knows nor loves God.

Without a definite chief aim to focus on, our minds will be shaped by forces external to ourselves, by the world we live in, and not by something we have chosen to embrace of our own free choice.

The Qualities we Must Have

As Christians pursuing a chief aim in life, there are three main qualities we must cultivate. These qualities come to us from God, but we have a role in allowing them to grow within us. These qualities are: faith, hope and love.

Hope is very much tied up with an expectation of good in the future. When your definite chief aim is deep within your heart, and is mixed with emotion, hope will be there. You should ask yourself this question: "What will it FEEL like when ... ?" and then add the condition hoped for. For example, ask yourself, "What will it feel like when I am walking close to God, filled with the Holy Spirit, conscious of having pleased the Father through doing His Will?" If you ask yourself such questions, it will motivate you with the power of godly hope. It will get you moving in the desired direction.

Faith on the other hand, is a certain inward knowing that God gives you out of a relationship with Him. We do not start out life as giants in faith, but we learn as we go along. Each step of faith leads us to the capacity for greater steps in the future. Faith declares with heartfelt confidence what God has spoken as if it is already done and established. Faith trusts confidently based on an inward assurance given by the Spirit of God. It springs up in hearts that have attended to the Word of God and allowed themselves to be enriched by that powerful seed that God has given. We must have faith to please God, and God will give us faith in relation to the things that must be along the path of going after our definite Chief Aim in Christ.

Love is the nature of God, and all that we do and think must ultimately be conformed to the ways of God in love. This is a great challenge, but not out of reach, since Jesus Christ lives in us by His Word and by His Spirit. As we are renewed in our thinking, that love of Christ can start to come out and enliven all that is in our lives. The love of Christ is mindful and considerate of others, seeks to be helpful, and doesn't get irritated when things go wrong or delays are encountered. We are called to be this way, and whatever our chief aim is in life, this is part of what God wants for us. Without this love, we are nothing, even if we have faith to move mountains and all kinds of spiritual gifts. (1 Corinthians 13:1-3).

The Advantages of A Definite Chief Aim in Life

When you have a definite chief aim and you have it from God, the following advantages will come:

You will stop wasting the enormous capacity which God has given you in purposeless, spasmodic thought.

Your mind will be stimulated to consider exactly how to take the next steps necessary for achievement.

You will find it easier to hear the voice of God concerning what must be done next in order to move closer to your goal.

You will be able to discipline your mind more easily because you will have a reference point to keep turning it back to in this world full of distractions.

Your heart will begin to imagine things that God desires, and you will be able to start to organise your thoughts and the thoughts of those you lead around the accomplishment of goals that relate to your definite chief aim.

You will be able to be a better leader, for people don't want to follow a leader who has no idea where he should be taking people.

You won't be easily seduced by the spirit of this age, the pleasures and values it offers, because the pain of what it costs you to indulge those things will become greater than any pleasure the worldly things may offer you. This is so because in your heart and mind you will attach great pleasure to things that move you towards your goal and great pain to those things which hinder your achievement. This is not to say that you won't take some time out for rest and recreation, because such things are needed to avoid us becoming burned out.

Your definite chief aim will enable you to filter out what is irrelevant to your purpose. Even "good" things which, if pursued, would hinder you will be put aside if you focus sufficiently on your Chief Aim. But if you don't have a Chief Aim, how can you focus on what is best? How can you be sure that you will not abandon your current efforts if something else comes along looking attractive?

Having a definite Chief Aim empowers you to organise effort towards the achievement of something. If we are not definite in purpose, we will drift on before really establishing anything of lasting value.

If you have the determination in God to fix your Definite Chief Aim in your mind and keep it there in your thoughts regularly, it will create a powerful desire in you towards the fulfillment of that Aim, which will in turn release the ability both to make the necessary personal sacrifices and draw upon the ability of God to fulfil it.

God will bring around you people who are in harmony with you, and your Definite Chief Aim. Like attracts like, and so you will find FRIENDS of similar passion and interest provided you yourself have a God-given passion and interest in a particular field. We don't get friends by just WANTING friends, there has to be a similarity of purpose and shared values for true friendship to flourish.

On the other hand, if you have no goal in life, you will find yourself either alone or with others who lack motivation and purpose, whose thinking will negatively affect you over time.

If you don't know your Chief Aim, and have subsiduary goals that relate to it, how will you know if you are on track towards doing the Will of God for your life?

How To Find Your Definite Chief Aim in Life

Seek God

For the Christian, a Definite Chief Aim must come out of our relationship with God. We are called to pray fervently and unceasingly in faith, according to the Word of God. So if you have no idea what your Definite Chief Aim should be, begin with the aim to know God, to know His voice, to know His Word, His Principles and His Ways. Also, seek to know specifically what giftings God has put in your life. This knowledge will be helpful in determining what your Definite Chief Aim should be.

Have a Goal to have a goal!

It would be a sad thing to select a Chief Aim in life that was out of harmony with God's plan for you. It would lead to frustration and disappointment. But even worse would be to have no aim at all. Disoriented Christians are easy targets for the enemy. So determine that you must have a Goal in life. If you don't have a goal yet, make finding the right goal your goal.

Be Definite

We can't just leave things with a General Aim like "knowing God". That should be there, but it is not enough. When you really know God, it won't be long until He gives you a sense of what your higher calling is in Him. And there will be concrete expressions of what that would be like which we should envisage. God knows that without a "hope of our calling" few of us would have sufficient motivation to put down the flesh and the old selfish ways of laziness and self-indulgence long enough to actually get to know God in a significant way. To know Christ involves denying self, taking up the cross, choosing to give up self will, and feeling some pain and suffering on the path of knowing the glory and pleasure of Christ! We need a fixed purpose that means more to us than our present comfort if we are to get anywhere in God.

A definite chief aim might be, "to stir up effective united prayer movements wherever God takes me", or "to raise the finest Christian children who will serve their generation in the will of God" or "to demonstrate the victory of Christ over the devil in the most convincing ways possible through the ministry of deliverance", or to "pray until this city has a major awakening which will look like this", or "to bring the whole truth to the whole church" (as the late Derek Prince aspired to do and achieved much along that line). The author of this article has as a Definite Chief Aim, "To fill the earth with the knowledge of the Glory of God". God may see fit to refine and make adjustments to what you initially conceive as your Definite Chief Aim in God, but it is important that you start with one, so that you can attain the many benefits described above. The thing must be sufficiently focused so you have an idea of what it will look like, and also how you can start on a small scale.

Take Stock of Your Gifts and your Ministry Calling

There are many good things we can do as Christians, but some things will give you more satisfaction than others. Some things you will desire more than others. Take note of the godly things that satisfy you and that you desire more - it is a clue to your calling. A person called as an evangelist is more satisfied leading people to Christ than a pastor who lacks that particular gift is. A person called as a Teacher is more attracted to study than flamboyant demonstrations and performances. A person called to the Ministry of Helps gets a lot of satisfaction out of making things work at a practical level. They enjoy problem solving. A Giver gets a buzz out of giving, whether they are called to be great business or professional people or not!

Your Definite Chief Aim will be in harmony with you gifts and callings. God will not call a person without the gift of pastor to be the greatest pastor the world has ever seen. You don't have to be the greatest pastor the world has seen to be fulfilled as a Christian. Your high calling may lie in another direction.

Write Something Down

Having spent some time in prayer, write down what you believe may be the highest goal you can aspire to write now, that you believe God would have for you. Meditate on that goal. If it seems to be missing something, trust God to reveal that to you, and write down the new version. God will make it clear.

You will have peace and a certain inward knowing when you have got the Definite Chief Aim right.

Remember that we belong to God now, it is not for us to choose any Chief Aim that takes our fancy, but these things must be done with the help of the Holy Spirit.

Focus on Your Goal

Every day review your Definite Chief Aim in God, and ponder that thought in a concentrated way for a few minutes at least. This will have great power and will enable you to move in the direction God wants. It will help you overcome the difficulties, setbacks and discouragements along the way. It will help your heart to be filled with Faith and Hope, and the world will be a better place as a result. The fulfillment of your Chief Aim will give God pleasure, and deep satisfaction to your own life. Nothing could be better.

Michael Fackerell