Does Desperation Mark Your Desire?

Psalm 63:1-8
O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. So I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands.

My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips, when I remember you upon my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night; for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy. My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me.

This was the passage that I meditated upon this morning, and what I found therein it is now my pleasure to share with you. What I saw was that the soul that desires God desires Him truly and biblically when the nature of this desire is that of utter desperation and dependence. The soul is at the end of itself. It has nothing to live on. It is stranded in a desert wilderness devoid of any means of survival—and the only hope in sight is God.

Truly, this is the state of each and every human being. The unbeliever does not recognize this gnawing barrenness as the innate thirst of the human soul for God, but the believer is keenly aware and his whole being cries out. The passage makes mention of both the "soul" and the "flesh" craving for satisfaction in God. This is but the true nature of our need, for both the material and immaterial parts of man long for the wholeness that only the Creator can bestow upon the creature.

This desire for God is also so consuming and pervasive that life on this world is considered as of lesser worth than seeing, feeling, and tasting the love of God. It is that tangible. The pleasures of the love of God are so real to both body and soul that they are likened to the sheer joy and satisfaction of having feasted on exquisite food. Having once tasted of the goodness of God, the soul now finds everything in this world as mere roughage, even unpalatable, and longs for the time when everyday would be a day of perfect feasting on God and His delights.

Do you crave for God with all that is you (not just "in" you)? Do you find Him as the supreme delight of your soul? Do you long for Him so much that His denial would be the death of you? God is so desirable that any desire of Him less than a desperate one is unworthy of Him.

The Humility of Zeal

Ps 69:9
For the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up; and the reproaches of them that reproached thee are fallen upon me.


Ps 119:139
My zeal hath consumed me, because mine enemies have forgotten thy words.

Ga 4:18
But it is good to be zealously affected always in a good thing, and not only when I am present with you.

If a thing is worth doing, then it is worth doing with one's whole heart, mind, and strength. If God, in our relationship with Him as Father, Savior, Lord, Helper, and Sanctifier, is the Pearl of Great Price to our souls, then knowing Him and seeking to please Him should so consume us that all else in our current existence must necessarily fade to gray.

Do we presently have sack loads of issues on our backs, encumbering our progress and stripping us of joy? It may be that we have allowed our zeal for God to wane. It may be that we have lost the peculiarity that must mark the child of God for having been so immersed in the world's pursuits. Have we been seeking success and the affirmation of the world and our fallen selves to the snuffing out of the fire of God that once raged within?

Let us once more realize that life lived upon this earth can only have meaning, can only have worth, can only have significance if it is a life that accomplishes the purpose for which it was given existence by the Creator. It may be true that things are crumbling all around you. The things that once gave you fulfillment are no longer doing their job. The loved one has failed you; work has become a routine that wears you down; ministry has become a drudgery; habitual sins constantly erode your sense of joy and peace and diffuse guilt instead. These things are true for many of us, and yet only one thing is needed: AN UNDIVIDED PASSION FOR CHRIST. The difficult circumstances surrounding our lives may remain as they are, but rekindling Christ as our heated core and having Him as our FIRST LOVE, first in terms of position and primacy, are the only means of staying on this earth sane and sound.