The Chase

As I was thinking about my last blog where I wrote about Jesus leaving the 99 and chasing after the 1, I started to think about how God created us to chase or be chased.

God pursues us and we pursue God. Men pursue women and unfortunately, some women pursue men. God didn't create women to be pursuers, he created them to be responders. It's the same in the botanical world. The pollinator (bee) seeks out the flower. In the animal world, predators chase after their prey. Now, God could have done that differently. He could have had the prey, once seeing they were about to be hunted, could have been made to freeze in place and drop dead of a heart attack. That takes all the fun out of the pursuit, plus it wouldn't give the prey the free will to fight for their life by running away. You'd have a lot of unfit, fat predators in the animal kingdom that way. God is consistent, if he did that in the animal world, he would probably do that in the human world. The human race would be wiped out in no time. I digress.

So, why would God create 'the chase'? Why would he give all of us a desire to go after something, to chase after something with passion? I think part of it is a survival instinct. In this day and age at least in this country and other developed nations, we don't have to chase after our food, we just leisurely drive our car to the grocery store. No violence, no running, no chase.

But inside us we have this drive to achieve, to conquer something. Some people conquer mountain tops or marathons or their Olympic event. Some people seek after a disciplined life. No matter what we decide to chase after, God gives us a choice. It's called free will. This free will gives us the choice to decide to chase after good things or bad things. Some who seeking joy and satisfaction in this life chase after things that aren't good for them, like drugs, alcohol, ungodly relationships, or material possessions. After a while, they discover these things don't bring satisfaction and the joy is very short lived.

Seeking after God and his will is a good choice. If you look up the word Seek in your Bible's concordance, you will find all kinds of verses on seeking. We're told to pray and seek His face and turn from our evil ways, to seek His will in all we do, not to seek honors, to seek the Lord while we can, not to seek ending our marriage, and that God rewards those who sincerely seek Him.

God designed us with a desire to pursue Him. He also gave us that same desire to pursue interests. It's our choice whether we use that desire to pursue good things or evil things. Choose the good, always.

Blessings this cool Monday.