Our Aim

I was reading this today. This verse struck me: The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.

Our aim is love. and not just any love.

This love issues (comes out of)
a pure heart
and
a good conscience
and
a sincere heart.

Without this love it is easy to be led astray, to get caught up in things you don't need to. The church that Timothy was serving in was being led astray by silly discussions into genealogies, myths, different doctrines, legalism and so forth. ALl because....they forgot what their aim was truly to be. The aim of the Christian is love.

That doesn't mean that the law doesn't have it's place. The law teaches us important things. It teaches us where we are failing in meeting our aim. It teaches us whatever is contrary to sound doctrine.

Think about this for a moment. A person who's aim is love needs to have a pure heart, a good conscience and a sincere heart. If you don't, you can't aim for love.

How do we get "a pure heart, a good conscience and a sincere heart"?

We have to know God's word. We have to want to follow it. We have to be honest about wanting to live the life that God truly calls us to. We need to have a heart that longs after God.

A good conscience is one that knows it doing all that is supposed to. It doesn't hold reservations about things it did or didn't do. You're not saying..."shoot, I really should have held that door open for that lady", or "man, I wish I hadn't yelled at my child for doing that" or... you get the picture.

A pure heart. Ah... this one for me is hard. How do I have a pure heart? The only way I can think of, is if I continually turn to God and say God...help me to know what to think about, what to care about, help me to see beyond me. Help me God to see what you want me to see.

A sincere heart... that's a heart that earnestly, completely longs to be of God in all things, in all ways. It's a heart that is true blue.

I know I fail miserably in these areas. I really do. It's a thing of repentance, and sorrow and turning back again to God. But I know that as I strive to have a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere heart...it's a whole lot easier for me to show the love that I am to aim for. It makes it a whole lot easier for me to witness to non-believing friends and neighbours, for me to extend grace to a fellow believer who is annoying the life out of me (and thereby learn a better way to be), and so forth.

it's a journey! it's a life aim. And I want to aim for love.