What’s in it for me
Underlies every human attitude
Christian or non-Christian
That’s the general mood.
Paul calls it the flesh
It’s the human nature,
For the spiritually uncircumcised
It’s the bigger picture.
What’s in it for me
The objective and the outcome,
That’s where our focus is
From the rising of the sun.
It’s about our protection
And our prosperity,
It’s about us as individuals
And about our family.
Every deal we broker
Every scheme we pursue,
It’s about the “I”, my friend,
Never first about you.
“But they are exceptions,”
No doubt you will contend,
Yes, pertaining to important others,
Still the “I” in the end.
Whatever we do
Can be traced back to us
Even when we claim
To be closely following Jesus.
Paul speaks of this struggle
Even in the Christian,
It’s the problem in our fellowships,
It’s the underlying mission.
Even when we do for others
It’s about how we look,
It’s our image we are protecting
That’s straight out of our book.
If this poem offends you
Then you prove my point
But I am no different from you
For I sit on my mount.
It challenges our spirituality
As we walk with Christ
And sometimes as Christians
We are not too nice.
Testimonies are often sullied
Because self gets in the way
And if you are like me
It can really spoil your day.
There is that innate drive
Spontaneously to protect the “I”,
We push Christ in the background
And that I can’t deny.
Anger management:
You may want to call it that
But by whatever you call it
It is still the underlying fact.
What’s in it for me
Is what it boils right down to
And it is not only in you
But it is in me too.
It is not the accusing finger
But those pointing back,
When we do the Mathematics
There is an obvious fact.
Stewart Russell © March 2020
