Finding Fulfillment in 2020

Check out this video from the 2016 Golden Globe awards…

Pretty funny, right? But so sad and true too. I don’t know about you, but I’ve spent a large part of my life chasing the next achievement. The next level of comfort. The next award. Knowing deep down, as Jim Carrey says, those things “will never ultimately fulfill me.” There is something baked into the human recipe that that leaves us deeply thirsty to be known and loved. To make a name for ourselves. To matter. That’s why all those Disney movies of self-discovery resonate with us. If we could only “find our true selves” then the whole world would take notice and we would finally be fulfilled.

But this is a lie. From the very beginning, Scripture tells us that man has struggled with the sin of pride. The sin of wanting to make a name for ourselves like the Babel tower builders in Genesis 11. It’s through those efforts, we think, that we’ll find an identity that is truly impressive. An identity which will make us a star. A king. A queen. A…Christ. But despite Disney’s good intentions, God didn’t make a world where we could be the hero. Where we could be fulfilled by anything other than our relationship with Him, the Creator. God baked that desire to be known and loved into our recipe because He wanted us to find its fulfillment in Him.

As we enter into 2020 now with the hope of more closely “following Jesus” this year, we must first know that this is at the center of God’s desire. He doesn’t want us to follow Him because He wants to whip our lazy butt’s into shape. He doesn’t want us to follow Him because He’s on a megalomaniacal power trip. No, He wants us to follow Him because He wants to be with us. He wants to know us and love us. And be known by us and loved by us. He wants to help us flourish and find joy in Him as He finds joy in us.

But that begins with recognizing our pride and our desire to look for fulfillment in the next “award”. When Martin Luther said that “all of life is repentance”, he didn’t mean that we should spend all our days in self-deprecation. No, he meant that we should lay down our efforts to make a name for ourselves and then turn to the God of grace who has given us the greatest identity we could ever have. The identity of a son. Of a daughter. Of a follower.