The Journey of Desire

I have posted a lot this week, but I can't help it. This is really and truly been hitting me right where I am and I know that God is having me share this with all the singles out there, as well as married couples. In order for things to change in our lives, in order for us to receive from Jesus the things that He has desired for us all along (which is where the desire comes from), we have to come to the knowledge of these truths that are being spoken. To say this is an amazing book is not saying enough. Get it, read it, let it take you to where God wants and needs you to be. Allow Him to complete in you the work that He started so long ago. We will never "arrive" here on this earth, but there is so much more to the life He wants us to live than we are living. Haven't you said to God "There has got to be more than this? My heart truly yearns for more." I pray this is helping many of you out there as it is helping me. God desires for us to "get real" with Him in our prayers, in our intimacy with him. You see, He already "knows" our heart, our dreams, our "desires". So it is us that are not being honest with Him and ourselves. Read on and be so forever changed and blessed my friends. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving, we have so much to be thankful for. We serve an awesome, amazing God who loves us so much that He does not want us to stay in the place we are, but wants us to come up higher and walk in so much more. I love you all so much.

"Embarrassed by Desire?"
A young woman came to see me, as most seeking counseling do, because she was at the end of her rope. What had begun a year earlier as mild depression had sunk deeper and deeper until she found herself contemplating suicide. We met for many weeks, and I came to know a delightful woman with a poet’s heart, whose soul was buried beneath years not so much of tragedy but of neglect. This one particular afternoon, we had spoken for more than an hour of how deeply she longed for love, how almost completely ignored and misunderstood she felt her entire life. It was a tender, honest, and deeply moving session. As our time drew to a close, I asked her if she would pray with me. I could hardly believe what came next. She assumed a rather bland, religious tone to her voice and said something to the effect of “God, thank you for being here. Show me what I ought to do.” I found myself speechless. You’ve got to be kidding me, I thought. That’s not how you feel at all. I know your heart’s true cry. You are far more desperate than that.

Why are we so embarrassed by our desire? Why do we pretend that we’re doing fine, thank you, that we don’t need a thing? The persistent widow wasn’t too proud to seek help. Neither was the psalmist. Their humility allowed them to express their desire. How little we come to God with what really matters to us. How rare it is that we even admit it to ourselves. We don’t pray like Jesus because we don’t allow ourselves to be nearly so alive. We don’t allow ourselves to feel how desperate our situation truly is. We sense that our desire will undo us if we let it rise up in all its fullness. Wouldn’t it be better to bury the disappointment and the yearning and just get on with life? As Larry Crabb has pointed out, pretending seems a much more reliable road to Christian maturity. The only price we pay is a loss of soul, of communion with God, a loss of direction, and a loss of hope.
(The Journey of Desire , 60–61)

Prayers and Pleadings
The book of Hebrews describes the prayer life of Jesus in the following way: “While Jesus was here on earth, he offered prayers and pleadings, with a loud cry and tears, to the one who could deliver him” (5:7 NLT). That doesn’t sound like the way prayers are offered up in most churches on a typical Sunday morning. “Dear Lord, we thank you for this day, and we ask you to be with us in all we say and do. Amen.” No pleading here, no loud cries and tears. Our prayers are cordial, modest, even reverent. Eugene Peterson calls them “cut-flower prayers.” They are not like Jesus’ prayers, or, for that matter, like the psalms. The ranting and raving, the passion and ecstasy, the fury and desolation found in the psalms are so far from our religious expression that it seems hard to believe they were given to us as our guide to prayer. They seem so, well, desperate. Yet E. M. Bounds reminds us,

Desire gives fervor to prayer. The soul cannot be listless when some great desire fixes and inflames it . . .Strong desires make strong prayers . . . The neglect of prayer is the fearful token of dead spiritual desires . . .There can be no true praying without desire. (Man of Prayer)
(The Journey of Desire , 59–60)