Are Your Desires God's Desires?
Mark John Ostrum - 2011-11-03 00:00:00
It has been many years now since I?ve written an article for this site. For that, please forgive me.
My life has been quite full of so many blessings.
First I want to report that God continues to bless me immensely. In 2005 I met my wife, Sarah, online, and traveled to meet her in Cebu, The Philippines. In June 2006 she and her son, Rus, arrived in the United States. We were married on July 1, 2006. As all marriages are by no means perfect, including this one, I praise God every day for giving me a warm and loving wife and son. Each day instead of saying ?I could not be happier? I find myself saying ?I?ve never been happier.?
I am still working for the same company I started at in 2004 and God continues to bless me there and the company has been likewise blessed.
Rus is attending and excelling in his classes at Reformation Lutheran School here in San Diego. This is an excellent Christian day school for grades pre-K-8. Last year he received ?Highest Honors? in his work. Needless to say, Sarah and I are very proud of him.
I want to talk a little today about Psalm 37:4, ?Take delight in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart.? (NIV)
We all know of preachers like Creflo Dollar who teach ?Prosperity Gospel?, that is, to put it simply, if you have enough faith, God will make you rich.
In the last day or so my church?s Facebook page posted, ?Prayer is not asking what we wish of God, but what God wishes of us.? When I read this comment, I was immediately reminded of the above Psalm, and the false teachings that abound by those who tell us what our ?itching ears want to hear? (2 Tim 4:3).
I was told before my restoration in 2004 by a pastor that he hears me saying I am praying for the advancement of the Kingdom of God, but he sees that I am praying only for things for my own comfort, or my own pleasures. I have found myself once again asking God to give me this, give me that, where this and that are things for my own pleasure. How easy it is to forget the words of James 4, ?You do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.? (NIV)
God continues to bless me and my (still) new family. Yet the big blessings I ask for I have yet to receive.
I need to remember the Psalm above, and think not that ?He will give [me] the desires of [my] heart? to mean ?He will give me whatever I ask for,? expecting the material things that we think we will enjoy. We need to instead think about it from God?s perspective, ?He will give [me] the desires of [my] heart? really means he will put his desires for me within my heart, and they will become my own desires.
I still maintain His desire for me to pursue my ministry work, and it burns more every day. Yet I make excuses to not write, to not walk the ministry walk, to not step out of my comfort zone and boldly go out and work the ministry or even open up with those around me about my faith. I think, ?It is too hard, even dangerous, to talk about it at work, because I might offend someone and wind up getting fired.? I think, ?I?m too tired from the hard work I do, so I lack motivation to sit in front of my computer at home to write.? Many things just ?come up? to keep me from what I believe God?s desires for me are.
Despite the many blessings God continues to give, I often feel (quite wrongly) that I am not blessed enough, because more often than not I forget that God gives in HIS time, not mine. With all I?ve been through I should not simply know that as I do, but I need to live it. I need to remember He has been and likely always will be my ?Just In Time? God.
In the movie, ?Luther? there was a scene where his mentor sent him to Wittenburg to preach. Luther said he could not, he wasn?t worthy. The mentor said, ?We preach best that which we need to learn most.? Luther went to Wittenburg and eventually became the father of the Reformation.
May God grant to me the ability to remember to pray properly once again as I learned and wrote about in ?Proper Praying? in 2004. May you also be blessed and take to heart the message I am trying to express in this article.
It is not a matter of your ?lack of faith? if you do not receive great wealth by turning to Christ. This was never promised. Do not allow others to ?blame? you for your lack of faith; rather remember Jesus said ?If you have the faith the size of a mustard seed, you can do anything?.
All scripture says is that God wants us to make us all succeed and be prosperous. It us we who block his generosity. Instead, join me as I look at my motives for what I pray for, and whether or not I truly will use what God gives me to advance his Kingdom here on Earth. If you realize, as I do, that you are asking only for your own comfort or pleasure, then stop praying for ?this and that? and instead just ask God to give you the ability to ask only for things which you can use to glorify him, and further that you will really use His blessings for his glory and not your own.
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Go in Grace.
mj