My Stuff - Motivations

    Why does anybody do what they do? 

    Do they do it because of societal or peer pressure? Do they want to do good because it is the right thing to do, morally speaking? Do they want to do good to be seen as a good person in their community? Do they do good because they want to appease God? Do they do good because they want to please God? And they want to be pleasing to God for the simple fact that it pleases God? Or are they climbing the stairway to heaven be being good in the sight of God.

    No one can really know, I don't think. Even those doing good might be conflicted by this question. I feel that if a person is boastful about his good deeds or goodness that is sort of a tell that they are doing good for the wrong reasons.

    I think this is a question that is between the individual and himself or the individual and God. I don't always know the exact phrasing but there is a scripture that reads something like "Only God can know the heart of a man."

    I can say that I have read the Bible cover to cover, once. But I didn't do it for the right reasons. I know that now. I did it because I was commuting by train 45 minutes each way. I was reading the local paper but found that I was not getting any 'nourishment' from that. So I set it as a goal to read the Bible. I did it I know that I did not get the very most out of such a read as I should or would have had I read it for the 'right' reason. What I did get out of that read was that I do recall many scriptures, perhaps not verbatim, but can come close in a pinch. And in some circles that is impressive enough to have made it all the more worth while for me. The next thing I got out of that read was a feeling of frustration on the part of Jesus. If you read the Gospels back to back to back... you come away feeling that Jesus kept having to repeat himself over and over ad nauseam. It felt like the disciples were just too thick to get it. Something that I did get was a feeling that Judas was an unfortunate company man. He was tasked with possibly the most onerous of tasks that has ever been. He was called upon to betray Jesus. To sell Jesus out to the Romans. None of the disciples did any kind of good by Jesus. They, each and every one of them, was a fuck. Peter who said that he would never sell out Jesus denied him three time in a single night. The rest couldn't even stay awake one crumby night praying with Jesus. Just one fucking night. I have stayed awake for nearly 80 hours for a work project with a ridiculous deadline. And in my opinion that is NOTHING compared to staying awake with your Lord and Savior for just on crumby night. Just one night. But in order for Judas to do his job the rest of the flunkies had to fall asleep or they would have spirited Jesus away from the Garden to some remote place safe from the Romans. And in order for the crucifixion to take place somebody had to turn Jesus over to the Romans. So it fell to Judas. He collected his 30 pieces of silver but later threw himself over a bridge for the guilt that he did feel. I don't believe that it was the 30 pieces that motivated Judas but the knowledge that someone had to do that or there could be no ransom sacrifice and no resurrection and on and on and on.

    Just my understanding. I am no theological so take this with a grain of salt.