Why do you follow God?
At foundation, the proper motivation is self-interest. Many don’t want to believe this. How do you convince them?
Keep asking “why?”
If there is an answer at all to the question of “why?” it must be a reason and it must be a reason for that person. If you can convince a person to keep asking why, he will keep getting closer to the inevitable answer of self-interest.
Do you ever wonder about God and evil? The problem of evil?
How do we really know that God is good, and what does the Bible even mean, “God is good?”
Upstairs in a cozy corner of the church, my youth pastor put down his guitar and asked a question:
“What are you reading in the Bible? What’s hard to wrap your mind around?”
I thought I had a show-stopper:
God has called us to be worshipers. He calls us to sing; but not only to sing. He calls us to lift our hearts to him in all aspects of life. Worship means much more than singing.
The first step of my philosophical journey was reading The Fountainhead. The novel taught me to uncompromisingly seek my own rational self-interest. If values are personal and selfish, then I must choose them myself. From my smallest choice of personal taste, to my choices in friends or career, I cannot depend on others to set my direction. For every choice I make, I must have a reason.
I advocate an unusual approach to these topics based what I see as a foundational principle in Scripture: Holy Self-Interest.
The principle says:
“It is always in your rational self-interest to do the right thing.”
Rightly understood, self-interest and morality are inseparable. The right thing is the right thing because it leads to your own rational self-interest.
