"Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart."
This verse sometimes seems to give people the impression that if they just humor God for a while and pretend like he is the most important thing, that eventually they will get what they are really looking for. But I don't think that's really how it goes. It kind of reminds me of something my dad used to say when we'd have peas for dinner (we still sometimes have peas, we just don't have to have this conversation anymore). If I'd whiningly ask "Do I have to have peas?" he'd reply, "Do you want them?" If I said no, then the answer was "yes, you have to," but if the answer was yes, then he would say, "then you don't have to, but since you want to, you will anyways." Pretty much, it was a lose-lose situation for me if I was hoping to get out of eating peas. But as far as my health was concerned, it was a win-win. There was no way I was getting out of eating those peas.
This verse kind of reminds me of that. If I hang onto all the things I think I want more than anything else, God might not give them to me. He might make my life full of a bunch of other things that I don't really think are what he should have given me. The verse doesn't say, "Make God one of your priorities and you will get all the things you always thought you wanted." The first step is to delight yourself in God. But as soon as you decide to delight yourself in the Lord, you are surrendering the desires of your heart. You are saying "God, here are the things I think I want, but most of all I want you," and allowing him to change your desires into something new. That is a hard thing. There are some things that I am pretty confident that I really do want. But I don't think that I can hang onto them as the be all and end all and still be truly "delighting myself in the Lord." If I make God my everything, if I let him "have the whole tree down" as C.S. Lewis says (see my last post), then he will give me the desires of my heart. But my heart will be changed when I make him my all, and my desires are bound to change with my changing heart. Am I willing to let them?
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5 comments:
Janna: I wanted you to know that I really agree with what you are talking about and thought you said it very well. I think it's so easy to just have your list of things you "know" you want and to think thats it and wait for God to give it to you. But he has so many better things in store for us. Thanks. Thats a good thing to be reminded of, think about a lot, and start to pray for Christ mold you.
hey, I think you should exercise your talents and write more :)
you think i need exercise? it's that bad, hey? just jokes. i will try to write soon... i guess busyness isn't a very good excuse considering what it sounds like you are doing AND still managing to blog...
ha ha, whoops, i meant your literary talents, not your bodily talents. yes i am amazing in my blogingness. actually it is my lack of an exciting social life that makes frequent blogging possible. hence i concede the necessity of your blogging silence.
Well thought and said, dearie.
Dad
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