Thursday, March 8, 2012

The Desires of Your Heart

In "The Seven Longings of the Human Heart" by Mike Bickle, he talks about how we are to delight ourselves in the lord, and he will give us the desires of our heart. Most people think this means "if im a good Christian, God will give me what I want. If I live a good moral life, give to charities and attend church once a week God will give me a new car and nice house and white pocket fence." I agree with him that most people think this is what it means.

At best, you'll find a few people who think it means "as I get closer to  God, He will change my desires to be his desires. Before I wanted to get married, but once I'm closer, I'll want to be single. Before I wanted to be rich, but God will make me content with just enough." while I think this is closer than the first option, it's still not quite right. This concept seems like God is undermining us or manipulating us, making his love conditional, as if he's saying "if you loved me, you'd want this instead"

The reality is this. No dream is a bad one. Sex is a beautiful thing when inside the context of marriage. Marriage is a beautiful thing when the first love is Christ, and the second love remains as the spouse. You should not try to kill your dream, and many times you really don't even need to change it- you just need to pursue it in a righteous way. God would not give you a dream just to kill it.

The reality is that if your dream is to be a great mom, God probably wants you to be a great mom. If your dream is to own a big business, God probably wants you to own a big business. No dream is bad, and our God is a good God. However, the first and most important mission of our hearts should be to know Him, to grow in intimacy and passion for our Savior and Friend. Secondly, you are to let His love shine through you in such a way that others want what you have, so that as many as possible may be saved. So cling to your dream of that business, but remember that it is not simply an end, but a means for you to show the world how people of God run honest businesses. Cling to that dream of being a great mom, but remember that its another way to glorify him. Show all the other moms what it means to love their children with the love of Christ by loving your own children with His love.

All things were created by and for him, for his good pleasure. Thus, no dream is a bad dream, it just may be being pursued in a bad way. Pursue it by, through, and because of Him, through the power of the Spirit that works in you.

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