The Good Is Always The Enemy Of The Best

“‘I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth." 

 Revelation 3:15-16

This makes me think of something Oswald Chambers says in My Utmost for His Highest. Chambers, I believe, rightly saw what keeps so many believers from truly living out their faith. He says, “The greatest enemy of the life of faith in God is not sin, but good choices which are not quite good enough. The good is always the enemy of the best.”[1] I doubt many of you are struggling with gross immoralities and heinous sin. What holds us back, more often, is filling our lives with things that are good, but not necessarily the best. Maybe some good things need to be painfully removed so that we remember that remaining connected to the vine—Christ—is all that matters. The goal should be to allow God to prune our lives, even the good things we are clinging to, so that we can be even more fruitful for His Kingdom.

We are far too easily pleased

Matthew 13:44 

“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field” 

We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased. - C.S. Lewis

There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours.

The Best Investment

Matthew 20:28

"even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”