Maybe Fulfillment Comes in Commitment, Not Endless Options
I recently came across a commencement speech given by New York Times columnist David Brooks. He addressed Dartmouth's 2015 graduating class, noting that for so many people, their goal in life, their vision of fulfillment, is freedom–freedom to do whatever you want, freedom to achieve anything, freedom to choose your way of life or your partner or your career.
Those kinds of freedoms can be (but aren't always) a gift and a privilege. Most people don't have near unlimited options in life. But even for those who do have myriad choices, those endless possibilities are not necessarily where happiness and contentment can be found.
Brooks writes, “But your fulfillment in life will not come from how well you explore your freedom and keep your options open. That's the path to a frazzled, scattered life in which you try to please everyone and end up pleasing no one.”
Even if you're only trying to appease your own desires, our desires shift and change. Only chasing those desires when they feel desirable can send us on an exhausting road where we never quite catch what we're looking for.
Instead, what if our fulfillment actually comes not from endless options, but from making commitments?
Fulfillment in Commitments
“Making commitments,” Brooks says, “sounds intimidating, but it's not. Making a commitment simply means falling in love with something, and then building a structure of behavior around it that will carry you through when your love falters.”
Marriage, of course, is the most obvious example. For anyone married longer than about six minutes, you know that eventually the feelings of love will falter. But having a structure of behavior–habits, practices, disciplines, community, etc.–can help you through if and when you need.*
I think our faith is the same way. For most of us, there will come a point (or many points) when our faith will falter. We will doubt God. We will wrestle with why he works the way he does. We will question his ways and his timing. Our feelings of passion and excitement and inspiration will wane. We may even wonder, “What else is out there?”
But fulfillment doesn't come in endlessly chasing our options; it comes in committing to the things that are good, right, beautiful, and true. Fulfillment can't be found in the words of Job's wife who said, “Curse God and die” (Job 2:9). Rather, Job walks through the valley of the shadow of death. In the middle of the mess, he says, “Though he slay me, I will hope in him” (Job 13:15).
Job doesn't find what he wants by abandoning his Maker in the midst of distress; he doubles down on his commitment to his Redeemer (19:25). And in doing so, he finds redemption.
There are plenty of seasons when we need to pivot. There are relationships we may need to walk away from for very good reasons. There are jobs we need to quit, habits we need to break, goals we need to set aside. But in a culture constantly chasing the freedom of options, many of us can be stuck in a strange no-man's-land where we're not committed to anything. We're not deeply rooted. We're not holding fast to what matters. And so we're left like a wave of the sea, tossed around by the wind.
A Structure of Behavior
One main way of building that structure of behavior around our commitment to Jesus is through practicing the spiritual disciplines. Our transformation to become more like Christ is all by grace–but God uses practices like prayer, silence, and fasting along the way. Committing to be in the Word, even when we don't want to, can be a tool God uses to get us through the valley to the other side. Spending time in prayer–even if it's angry prayers of lament–can help us press in close to our Maker instead of running away.
When you think about your spiritual life, what does it look like to build a structure of behavior around that commitment? What does it look like to be so devoted to Him that even when all is shaken around you, you stand firm?
No matter where you are in your spiritual life and what you're facing, though, rest in this:
Even when we falter and fail, even when our commitment to Jesus seems only as strong as Peter's three denials, HE cannot and will not ever fail. His love will never waver and his faithfulness will never end.
Amen?
