Pressing On

It is exciting that a new school year is almost here! I can't believe how fast the summer has gone by! Now it's time to settle down and get back into that good ol' school routine!

As I'm looking ahead at the plethora of classes and activities that are about to fill up my weeks, I realize that I need to set some goals so that I can make the most of my time. One of them is to go to be early. The morning time is when I'm the most productive, so I plan on getting up extra early this year. Family are excellent accountability partners, and I've asked mine to keep me accountable.

Do you have any goals for this year? I would encourage you all to set one or two. Why? Goals give direction, an end to pursue. Without goals, it's easy to get distracted and not to care when you start to lag behind. Without goals, you can give up without feeling any guilt. When there are no expectations set, you can't let yourself down because you have nothing to live up to.

If goals are important for our daily life, how much more important they are for our spiritual life!

"...Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." Philippians 3:12-14

It makes me excited to think that Christ has a goal for me to reach! The goal: Christ likeness; conforming to the glorious image of Christ. The prise: Christ likeness obtained in heaven. We will never "arrive" in our spiritual life here on earth, but when God calls us to heaven, we will finally receive the prise that was an unattainable goal on earth.

Though we will never reach the goal of Christ likeness in this life, it keeps our lives focused on Him, so we can live a profitable life for Jesus. It's impossible to reach the goal just yet, but Christ can help us grow closer and closer to that goal.

So now it's time to get focused. What are you pressing on for?