Good Deeds, Impure Motives

1:15a, 17a Some, to be sure, are preaching Christ even from envy and strife... [they] proclaim Christ out of selfish ambition, rather than from pure motives

There are a number of surprising things in v.15-18. One of them we see here: it is possible to do a good thing for a bad reason. Certainly there is no activity more Christian or more virtuous than telling lost souls about the saving power of the gospel of Christ. And yet we see here that even this can be done (and has been done) not out of love but out of selfish ambition. And although Paul still rejoices in v.18 that the gospel is being preached (which we’ll get to later), this ought to move us to stop and evaluate our motives.

So often I justify myself on the basis of my activities, leaving the issue of motives out of consideration. I preach God’s word. That is a good thing to do. I must be a good Christian. But the fact is, it is very possible to preach God’s word for the wrong reason. It still does the people good if they hear God’s word accurately proclaimed (God OFTEN uses wrongly motivated preaching to produce real spiritual fruit in people’s lives). But it doesn’t win God’s favor for the preacher if he preaches for selfish reasons (I mean favor in the John 14:21 sense, not in the salvation sense).

(By the way, for those who aren’t preachers and who may have troubles imagining how a true Christian could preach out of selfish ambition, let me say that this is one of the biggest struggles for most preachers. Good preaching not only produces spiritual fruit in the lives of the hearers, it is also what wins the preacher praise, popularity, esteem and often his income. And it is VERY easy to seek to do the right thing - preach the word well - for these motives instead of for the Lord.)

Preaching is not the only godly exercise that can be done with wrong motives:

Prayer : We can pray - not to seek the Lord but either to be able to think of ourselves as godly or just to be able to get what we want in the flesh (James 4:3).

Love : We can be kind and loving - not for the sake of Christ but to get others to like us.

Study of Scripture : We can learn a lot about the Bible - not to walk with God but to impress others.

There will be many evangelists, preachers, pray-ers, and Bible scholars in hell (Matt.7:22-23 "Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’"). There will be many in hell who have had great effect for the gospel. It’s not enough to do the work of the Kingdom, one must seek first the Kingdom in his own soul.

Dear Father in heaven, I am so quick to pat myself on the back for good things that I do. I love to think highly of myself. But so much of what I do is for self. And even when I do things for You, I also do them for me. How I love the praise and the esteem and the respect of men. How I love for people to think I am a godly man! Forgive me for preaching to impress. Forgive me for praying and loving and singing and studying for my own benefit. Forgive me for caring so much about what others think of me and so little about what You think of me. Please, Lord, help me do the right thing for the right reason. Help me to do all things for You.