Devotional

Goals

By ColleenShumaker

Ready 
"Not that I have already reached the goal or am already fully mature, but I make every effort to take hold of it because I also have been taken hold of by Christ Jesus. Brothers, I do not consider myself to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: forgetting what is behind and reaching forward to what is ahead, I pursue as my goal the prize promised by God's heavenly call in Christ Jesus."

-Philippians 3:12-14 

Set 
Athletes have goals. That is what we do! We make goals and then strive every day to reach them. If we didn't have a list of goals, then we would stop improving, stop moving forward. We would have nothing to aim for.
 
I am a huge fan of Coach Vince Lombardi and have read almost all of his books, including the book "Vince Lombardi Rules." This book says that his number one rule is "Self-Knowledge": to know yourself and what your talents are so that you can work for them.
 
This rule can be compared to living your life for Christ. God recently impressed on me that I need to start using my gifts for Him, but I had no idea how. I thought I was! I was reading my Bible and giving the glory of my sports talents to Him. But, I was not living my life for Him, I was only giving Him the credit. That's where self-knowledge and goals came into play. I needed to, first, make it a goal to have Christ in my life consistently, be in the word and be in prayer. That would be my first goal. And to attain this goal would be a never-ending process, but it would be a major step in living my life for Christ.
 
The next goal was to find out what gifts God wanted me to use for Him. This was hard, but it was nevertheless a goal: to serve Christ with my talents. Because I am still young, I have not yet found out what direction I am headed in, but I have made up my mind to achieve these goals.
 

I know it's hard to figure out how to live your life for God when you're busy with sports or school, but if you start by setting a goal and letting God work in you, you will be on the right path. 

Go 
1. Have you made up your mind to live your life for God?
2. Have you set a goal?

3. Have you found where your walk is with Christ right now and where He wants you to move from there? 

Workout 
2 Corinthians 5:9

2 Timothy 2:15 

Bible Reference: 
2 Timothy 2