{"id":449,"date":"2007-01-06T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2007-01-06T06:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html"},"modified":"2007-01-06T06:00:00","modified_gmt":"2007-01-06T06:00:00","slug":"my-lifes-goal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html","title":{"rendered":"My life&#8217;s goal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>God asks the question&#8230;<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><em>&quot;&#8230;for who is he who will devote himself to be close to me?&quot; <\/em> Jeremiah 30.21b<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">I know that this question is rhetorical and the context is messianic but all I know is that it has become my life&#8217;s goal.&nbsp; To live a life devoted to being close to God&#8230;is there any other thing in life more important than that?<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">I took this on as my reason for existing a couple of years ago and it has propelled me to a head long pursuit of the heart of my father in heaven.&nbsp; I long for Him and His presence and my deepest desire is to someday be an answer to the question with every moment of my life.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Lord Jesus,<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">I am yours&#8230;completely.&nbsp; Forgive me of the petty and meaningless things that I have allowed to distract me from you.&nbsp; Lord, distract me from the things that distract me from you.&nbsp; See my heart&#8230;I offer it and all that I have to knowing you more and more each day.&nbsp; You ask &quot;who is he&quot;&#8230;Lord I am he!&nbsp; I desire to be and my your mercy and grace I will be.&nbsp; Amen<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>God asks the question&#8230; &quot;&#8230;for who is he who will devote himself to be close to me?&quot; Jeremiah 30.21b I know that this question is rhetorical and the context is messianic but all I know is that it has become my life&#8217;s goal.&nbsp; To live a life devoted to being close to God&#8230;is there any&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":79,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-misc"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>My life&#039;s goal - The Jazz Theologian<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"My life&#039;s goal - The Jazz Theologian\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"God asks the question&#8230; &quot;&#8230;for who is he who will devote himself to be close to me?&quot; Jeremiah 30.21b I know that this question is rhetorical and the context is messianic but all I know is that it has become my life&#8217;s goal.&nbsp; To live a life devoted to being close to God&#8230;is there any&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Jazz Theologian\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2007-01-06T06:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Robert Gelinas\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"My life's goal - The Jazz Theologian","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"My life's goal - The Jazz Theologian","og_description":"God asks the question&#8230; &quot;&#8230;for who is he who will devote himself to be close to me?&quot; Jeremiah 30.21b I know that this question is rhetorical and the context is messianic but all I know is that it has become my life&#8217;s goal.&nbsp; To live a life devoted to being close to God&#8230;is there any&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html","og_site_name":"The Jazz Theologian","article_published_time":"2007-01-06T06:00:00+00:00","author":"Robert Gelinas","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html","name":"My life's goal - The Jazz Theologian","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#website"},"datePublished":"2007-01-06T06:00:00+00:00","dateModified":"2007-01-06T06:00:00+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#\/schema\/person\/5e3ecb360405bd8603a61c7115194e01"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2007\/01\/my-lifes-goal.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"My life&#8217;s goal"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/","name":"The Jazz Theologian","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Robert Gelinas on Composing a Jazz-Shaped Faith","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#\/schema\/person\/5e3ecb360405bd8603a61c7115194e01","name":"Robert Gelinas","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/fbe\/fbe4a8ffc24002390e969652fba5c72bx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/fbe\/fbe4a8ffc24002390e969652fba5c72bx96.jpg","caption":"Robert Gelinas"},"description":"\"For more information visit: Jazztheologian.com Robert Gelinas is Lead-Pastor (and resident Jazz Theologian) of Colorado Community Church\u00e2\u20ac\u201da multi-cultural, interdenominational community of 3000+ followers of Christ in the Denver area. Author of Finding the Groove: Composing a Jazz-Shaped Faith (Zondervan) and the upcoming, Strange Fruit: The Cross as a Way of Life (2011). Founder of Project 127, a ministry dedicated to seeing the day when there are no children waiting for homes in Colorado's foster care system. Robert deeply desires to see the body of Christ mobilized to serve the least of these. The poor, the down and out, the disenfranchised and disabled, those deemed unimportant and the unborn. He believes that God loves all people yet he has a special heart for the poor and the poor in spirit, the miserable and the marginalized. A Contributing Editor for Leadership Journal and Urbanfaith.com. He acquired a B.A. in Bibilcal Studies from Colorado Christian University and a Master of Arts in World Christianity (Missiology) from Denver Seminary. Robert is married to the love of his life, Barbara, and they have six energetic children (3 boys &amp; 3 girls--one bio, five adopted--two from Ethiopia). Friend of God...Passionate about the Body of Christ...Lover of this thing called jazz! Please visit Jazztheologian.com for contact info., speaking schedule, videos, Facebook and Twitter.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/author\/rgelinas"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/79"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/449\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}