Christian Counseling Service -- Devotions

I want what you want

Thursday, May 27, 1999

Mark 10:51
Jesus says, "What do you want me to do for you?"

Most of the time I ask God what he wants for me. He knows me better than I know myself; after all, he "created my inmost being, his eyes saw my unformed body, all the days ordained for me were written in his book before one of them came to be" (Psalm 139). Father knows best.

So why is it sometimes hard for me (and so many others around me) to hear God, to know what he wants for me. It's such a common complaint. Because his will seems so difficult to discern I stop listening and start acting on my own. Or become paralyzed by doubt.

But Jesus cuts through this with his question. "What do you want?" Can I answer that question with my eyes open, taking responsibility for my words? As Melannie Svoboda writes, "Many of us tend to mistrust our wants and desires, as if we assume they are always selfish and sinful. Yet one of the main ways God speaks to us is through the deepest longings of our own heart."

I can choose to accept those deep longings or not. Sometimes they seem selfish. When I tell my Father about them anyway, he loves me for my honesty and purifies my heart. When God gets involved in my selfishness, he changes it and makes it new.

God speaks inside me and it sounds like me! So I seek to learn the art of trusting what I hear, and speaking it back to him, instead of hiding from it.

Lord, search my heart and show me what I need to see. I want to do what you're doing in me.

Devotions Archive

I want what you want

Thursday, May 27, 1999