Loving God

Loving God is not only right but also in the interest of my own joy. To glorify God and enjoy Him forever are not two different purposes or ends but unite together as the greatest purpose of life. I get my greatest delight when I am lost in wonder awe and praise of God. In that very praising of God I can see why the pursuit of self-interest is not necessarily selfish. When I am lost in wonder awe and praise, I am the happiest I can become, but also the least self-conscious because when I am focused on God, I am not focused on myself.

This is the same dynamic that I experience in a good friendship. With people I don’t know I might feel self-conscious and wonder how they are responding to what I say and do. But with a really good friend I can lose myself in conversation, each of us conveying our deepest feelings without self-centeredness. Our joy is great, but we are focused on the other and the delight in the discussion we are having. C.S. Lewis summarizes this experience:

…the happiest moments are when we forget our precious selves…but have everything else (God, our fellow humans, the animals, the garden, and the sky) instead….

In this experience, I am not self-oriented but extremely happy. I am doing that which is in the interest of my own joy but not selfishly. I am full of wondrous joy but “disinterested.”