Run Hard...and Keep Running! (It's not a float down the Lazy River)

Our conversation was pleasant and easy, time drew to a close the easy flow of words,  and I asked her, "What can I be praying for you about?"
Exact wording aside, she basically said "I want to pursue God in my own life without mere duty or obligation, but it is often hard...my heart grows dull...a task quickly captures my attention.  And I'm tempted to overlook time with Him..."
Her response echoed my own heart, often & regularly. The struggle she described is a common one. (Do you  sense this at times in your spiritual walk?)
This post is to encourage all of us.

First of all, let me clarify with some sound (but brief!) theology...
In the discussion of grace and works as relates to our salvation, our own efforts are recognized as null and void. Christ had strong words of condemnation for this type of works righteousness, and the Pharisees received his divine angst with severity. We cannot do anything to earn favor with God. This muddies the divine sacrifice of Christ’s all sufficient and only efficient work. It dims the exclusive brilliance of the gospel.
And the sufficiency of Christ's work to produce holiness of life following our salvation is also just as strongly in play.
His Spirit produces growth, godliness, and fruit (including a desire to spend time with him).
I get that. (with HUGE thankfulness to God, I might add!)

But, in the discussion of my own heart and its pursuit of holiness after salvation, however, I have found one truth to ring loud and clear—both in my own experience and within the pages of Scripture. In my pursuit of a heart that loves God supremely and of a life that displays this, no progress is made apart from persistent, sweat-staining, self denying work.
I will never drift into holiness (as one described it); instead, I must run hard after God..

Run hard after God.

What does this look like?
Well, it’s often ugly; it’s ongoing, it is exertion and toil as I fight against my sinful, selfish bent; and my heart (“prone to wander, Lord I feel it”) resists…continually!

Do you sense and experience this tension?
~I long to love God with my whole heart, soul, mind and strength, yet I reach to find satisfaction and joy in my children, my husband, my friends and time for myself.
~I want to love God’s Word and to seek after it as silver and yet I spend hours with a book, a computer, a task or another venture that dulls my appetite and robs my time for the Bible (and so I fit in my pittance of minutes in the Word with a cursory read—‘my devotions’ complete.)
~I’d like to encourage another to love God, to follow His ways and Him, yet I find myself enticed with this world’s affairs (trivial conversation, procuring “stuff”, transitory activities, endless duties, my own 'down time') to the neglect of the next world’s (God’s agenda of supernatural priority-am I even aware of the spiritual realm all around me?!).
~I want my heart to be free of sin, to root out idols and love God purely, but when struggles come, or tensions arise with another, I am quick to point my finger outward (to other people, to my circumstances) to find blame instead of pointing it first and most carefully in scrutiny of my own traitorous and self-seeking heart.

~I say I want to follow, serve & love God, but I yawn with disinterest or laziness at the hard work of listening to His truth, dissecting its message, disciplining my mind to meditate, focusing attentively to the entire sermon. And I wonder at my apathy?

The pursuit of holiness---of a heart after God’s---is wrought with intense effort against these things.

And I must ardently resist the drag of what naturally pulls me back.
So every day I choose…
~Will I fight hard—my sin, my tendency to ‘ease up’, to relax the disciplines that keep my eyes on Christ, the temptation to thwart the occasions that put God’s truth front and foremost, the default to do what is ‘easiest?
~Will I press hard—to see and choose God’s eternal values in my day to day enterprises, to push past the pain in the many denials loving Him most requires, to point my eyes upward instead of inward?
Holiness...Cultivating A Desire to Know and Love God.
For me it means running hard into monsoon-like resistance. And not giving up.
But how beautiful the prize that awaits if I persevere.
For as I run, I feel God's presence, communion, and the Holy Spirit (often & regularly) transforms my heart to one that yearns for God.
By running in this manner, I (He?!) creates desire

Will you help me …will you join me….in running hard after God?!