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One of the things I’ve become acutely aware of in my spiritual journey is that I have to constantly question my motivations. Am I doing something good? Or am I doing something good, for me? In other words, is there a hidden agenda? I’ve deeply desired some things in my life, or produced certain accomplishments, which seemed very noble and holy. But these things were tainted, because at their core, they were just pitiful attempts to fuel my flesh and to feed my insecurities and need for affirmation. Most of us, if we are honest with ourselves, have been guilty of hiding unhealthy motivations under the guise of God-centered activities and accomplishments. Or is it just me?
There’s a great example of this in John 12:1-6. Martha is washing the feet of Jesus with an expensive oil. Judas complains and suggests it would have been better to sell the oil and give money to the poor.
At face value, it is easy to stop and think that maybe Judas had a point. You might even suggest he was being a noble man. But the passage goes on to explain that Judas wasn’t really being sincere. He didn’t care about the poor. He was a thief who frequently stole from the money box. He was using a seemingly God-centered gesture to quench a flesh-filled motivation.
For Judas, it was all about the money. After all, he eventually sold Jesus out for a small payday. Feeding his greed was the only way Judas knew to operate. For me, it’s been affirmation. That means I’ve been a performer all my life. An over-achiever. In the classroom. On the job. Whatever it was, I needed others to perceive that I was awesome at it. Otherwise, I had no peace. I’ve had success in my life. I’ve done some good things. In recent years, my marketing business actually helped a lot of worthy causes. But I did it all under the motivation of being affirmed. That was the hole in me. It wasn’t always a conscious decision. Judas obviously knew very well that he was scheming to steal from the money box when he suggested selling the oil to benefit the poor. In my life, the underlying motivation was usually much harder to detect, unless I went specifically searching for it.
Lately, I’ve done a lot of that. Searching out my true motivations. Weighing them. Separating the healthy from the unhealthy. It’s very sobering work. You start to realize how much of your life has been dedicated to filling holes and how truly disingenuous human beings can actually be.
This also causes me to pause when I’m feeling judgmental of others. As you know, it’s so much easier to psychoanalyze other people’s problems. It’s easier to see self-centered agendas and selfish motivations in someone else. In the past, I’ve been fairly swift to judge individuals when I get a whiff of them trying to trojan horse their way to what they really want or need.
But I’ve come to realize that most people are doing this without really realizing it. And regardless of whether they are aware of it or not, chances are they don’t fully understand how to control it, or have any idea where it’s coming from in the first place. That is unfortunate, because the most likely driver of their unhealthy motivations is an unresolved wound from their past that needs healing. Some experience that created trauma. A lie they have always believed. A betrayal that left them without faith in God or others, or maybe even themselves. Whatever it is, it left a hole. And holes beg to be filled. So, we silly humans try to fill them. We get very creative with this process, but it usually takes failure in our own clever actions to finally accept that God is the only way the hole can be filled, ultimately.
So, we act like Judas and set ourselves up the best ways we know how. Whatever it takes to get us through to the next fix. We get branded as hypocrites, either by ourselves or others or both. We lose our connection with authenticity. That’s not a very joyful way to live. Trust me.
I’ll leave you with this. The next time you are about to do something others would consider “good” or “admirable” or “valiant” or any other positive and affirming reaction, do a quick check of your heart to understand why you are doing it in the first place. Is there any underlying motivation that you need to bring to God and wrestle down to the ground? Marketing folks will tell you that to truly connect with a specific audience, you have to put yourself in their shoes and ask the question, “What’s in it for me?” Turn that question around, and pose it to yourself. Maybe a hidden agenda will arise out of your answer.
Secondly, the next time you are ready to lay down the hammer of judgment on someone else, stop and ask yourself what might be driving their actions? What is the source of their pain? What hole are they trying to fill? What is their hidden agenda? Or how about this one. What is it about their actions that has you so upset? Do you see something in them that reflects something about yourself that you really don’t like? You will have a much more empathetic and Christ-centered response to them, regardless of what they have done. And maybe you’ll be compelled to gently speak truth into their life, and yours, while discovering what’s hiding inside.
I have an incredibly important decision for you to make today. Are you going to be an orange, or an onion?
To be fair, you probably will need some context to appropriately answer this question. So, let’s start with a brief download on the relevant qualities of, and key differences between, oranges and onions.
An orange has a colorful, durable outer layer. Some find it extremely difficult to fully remove an orange’s peel, leaving some to even proclaim oranges are not worth the trouble it takes to eat one. Onions, on the other hand, have a very thin outer layer that doesn’t really preclude you from seeing what’s likely to be inside. It’s very thin, and peels off nice and easy, offering little resistance as you try to open it up.
Once inside, an orange is pretty straight forward. You’ve got your slices and some strings and a few seeds, maybe. Once you’ve broken through the exterior, you have a full view. Onions are a bit more complicated. You just keep peeling back layer, after layer, after layer. It seems you never get all the way to through an onion. It has so much more depth.
An orange tastes nice and sweet and refreshing. It offends only the most picky of people. It can easily be overpowered in smoothie mixes. While an onion, well, it is a force to be reckoned with. It can bring tears to your eyes, burning little daggers of tears. It has a smell and taste that is bold and not everyone is on board with it.
An orange doesn’t really do much for other foods. It sort of does its own thing. Sure it can have an impact on things such as water, but it’s not a food you would use to bring out the best in other foods. Onions are different. They pull flavor out of the foods they touch. They enhance the aroma and the taste of many dishes.
Spiritually speaking, we all have a choice to make. Are we going to be like the orange, or like the onion?
If you are an orange, you look something like this. You wear masks almost always. You have a tough outer shell that is hard to break through, and even if someone is able to penetrate it, all they will find is sugary sweetness. You’ve buried the rest so deep within yourself that it might as well be undetectable. You don’t offend. You don’t really stand for anything. You avoid conflict. And you don’t really have any kind of big impact on those around you. You just look for people who are content to sit in a bowl of fruit and look pretty, while hoping no one will want to squeeze you.
Meanwhile, the onions among us are very different. If you are an onion, your outer shell is transparent and thin, as if you are inviting people to see through and into you. The more someone gets to know you, the more layers they peel through and the more truth they see. You are a story with many chapters, and you don’t mind sharing every single one of them. You are powerful and bold, and way too honest for many people. You sometimes find that you have made someone uncomfortable because you refuse to be an orange like they are. On the other hand, you also positively impact many others and infuse their life with new hope and passion. You make them better, just because you share a small piece of yourself with them.
I’ve been an orange a lot longer than I’ve been an onion. And let me tell you. Being either is painful in this life. But only one has the potential to deliver you and to reveal God’s promises to you. I’ll let you guess which one that is.
*Writer’s note. Of course this metaphor is flawed, like most metaphors. Please don’t get hung up on any slight inaccuracies to the physical characteristics of onions and oranges. If you do, I commend you on your knowledge of round foods, but I am sad because you missed the entire point of this blog post. 🙂
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