The Long Run

To set the tone of this blog let me introduce myself. My name is Jeffrey Wright and I am a believer of our lord Jesus. Being grateful in what God has given us is important. That said; I am grateful to have this opportunity to share with you this blog.
I want to take an economic approach to achieving the long run goal of eternal life with God. I know I sound boring already but bear with me. This idea comes from an older

sermon about investing that I preached a few months ago and from the microeconomics course that I had more recently studied in college. (Don’t worry I don’t have graphs and charts)
Just for the sake of definition: long run equilibrium means over a long period of time our lives balances. The balance is between our life with God while and our life in this world. It comes from the life long struggle of, “How do we being 100% Christian in a non-Christian world?” I want to help shine a light on how to achieve this long run equilibrium. So, how do we maintaining our relationship with Jesus for the long run?
I want to cover three main points: Our long run perspective, setting SMART goals, and maintaining the long run goal.
Often a verse comes to mind that I grew up with that captures the essence of our perspective on the long run. Matthew 7:24-27
“Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.” - NIV
We read this and discuss the perspective of building our lives on Jesus. However, right now I want us to focus on the long run relationship we have with Jesus. We know that the truth is the rock and when life gnashes its terrible teeth and roars its terrible roars, the rock will hold our lives firm. As long as we build on the rock, of course. I think it is important to notice that the foolish man built the SAME house but on the wrong beliefs. Things got hard: it crumbled.
Jesus says to us that, “everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man...” As we know, practice is not a destination but a series of actions and plans that lead us to become better. A journey if you will.
The idea here is that we practice the words of God and plan for the long run. The wise and foolish builders is a piece of God’s word about the lives lived by two main groups of people: The wise who spend their whole lives practicing Jesus words, and the foolish who spend their whole lives practicing their own selfish desires.
Support for this perspective: Colossians 3:1-4
“[3:1] Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. [2] Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. [3] For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. [4] When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.”
We are encouraged to look to the long run goal of our life.
Much like investing our most valuable resource: time, into God for the long term, we align our focus on long run as well. Our aim is to achieve the long run goal. That goal is eternal life. Each moment of our existence is that we will live forever. We look forward to that. It is important to have the perspective that this world is not our home and we are just passing through. However, this is meaningless without a plan. Right?
That should be obvious that anything without a plan is only a wish (or dream). However, plans need to be real. There is an acronym known as SMART in regards to setting SMART goals. You may already be aware of this and that is great. Use it.
Specific,
Measurable,
Achievable,
Realistic, and
Timely.
God gave us a defined goal and has helped us be SMART about it (get it?). We are told in Philippians 2: 12- 13,
“…continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, [13] for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose.”
Each one of our plans is unique to us as individuals. We start to listen to Jesus instructions from his ministries starting with his sermon on the mount. We study his every movement and his motives behind them to learn more about our Goal.
A book I had read discussed the lifestyle of successful business owners.

1. They budget a minimum of 16 hours ones a year with an additional hour once a week.
2. They focus on achievable tasks that can be done within the day that fit with overall goal.
3. They never lose focus of their long run objective.
4. They remain humble.
5. They always seek out new ways to improve themselves.

We can see by this short list that these business practices derive from God’s instructions. All of this is simply discipline. They came to these conclusions on their own but God already provided a roadmap to being a successful Christian. God already gave us the tools to be successful. God gave us our long run perspective and our SMART goal. Which brings me to my final point: Maintaining our long run goal.
I am going to use a fascinating story from the business world to support my case (if you haven’t guessed, I enjoy business). The information I am using is from a case study found in the books, Good to Great as well as, Start with Why.
Lee Iacocca may sound familiar to some of you. He was the CEO of Chrysler during the 1980’s saving it from near total destruction. During the early stages of his career there, Chrysler’s stock prices shot up like a rocket and outperformed every other manufacturer including his previous employer Ford. He quickly became popular, especially in the stock market. Later in his career, things became messy, stocks dropped, eventually Chrysler came crashing down, and today still hangs on with the help of RAM and Jeep.
The reason for Chrysler falling under the direction of Lee Iacocca is that he lost focus of the long run goal. All the popularity of his success caused him to shift his focus to the here and now. He purchased a European car company that made luxury sports cars, which was a flop in America. When focused, the business did amazing. When he lost focus, the business crashed.
God has given us every tool to be successful in achieving the ultimate goal. Our most important tool to maintaining our long run goal is to stay focused.
We are familiar with, 1 Corinthians 13:13
“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”
As chapter 13 of, 1 Corinthians explains, if we do anything, but have not love we are nothing. Love is our focus. Love is the reason we do anything. Love is the key to our long run goal.
By focusing on love, we can clearly see and understand fully our long run perspective. We want our forever with God. We can easily set our SMART goals and, successfully maintain our focus on the long run goal by showing God’s love to his creation.
I hope I have challenged you to think about your relationship with your long run goal.