To be successful - however we measure success?
To be recognized by others for what we have done or who we are?
To be loved? To love?
To be married? To escape marriage? To have children? To change our mistakes in raising children?How badly do we desire it - whatever "it" is?
Have we folded it up, put it away in a box somewhere in a storage room, locking the door so it is hidden where no one else can see it - where we can't get to it anymore - where God can't touch it? After all, isn't it easier to breathe, to live, without the disappointment of unfulfilled desire hanging over us?
Yet if we will stop and be still - listen closely - God is calling to each of us - to our very souls. He is calling us to come to Him and to fulfill the deepest desires of our hearts in Him. "Come to Me," He says over and over. "I AM the Way. I AM the Truth. I AM the Life. I AM everything you are looking for."
Nothing will happen in our lives, in our relationships, in our communities if we put away desires and settle for things as they are, if we do not take these desires to Him and ask in confident faith for Him to fulfill them.
He is not Santa Claus. He is not a catalog where we can put in our order or give our wish list. He is a good God who cannot be put "into a box." When we ask, we must trust His goodness, because the fulfillment of our desires may not look at all like what we envisioned when we asked. But the fulfillment of our requests will be His best answer for us - not just what is good, but what is truly BEST.
Every desire, every hunger, every thirst deep within our hearts and souls is satisfied in Him. He is calling us to come and bask in His presence - to come experience life with Him and in Him - life in abundant fullness.
Why do we hesitate? Why do we not go to Him?
To come, to seek, to desire is to risk everything - to risk disappointment, to risk pain and failure. To come means to abandon all in the quest for and hope of fulfillment - to let go of what is safe and secure and to allow Him to fulfill each desire with His best.
Perhaps that best is the patience that comes from interceding for loved ones and waiting for Him to change their hearts. Perhaps it is a heart that has found rest in Him despite the wounds and pain inflicted by those who claim to love us. Perhaps it is freedom to obey despite the criticism of others. Perhaps it is a soul that has come through the lonely fires of singleness and found Him sufficient.
Whatever His best looks like, coming to Him will both empty us and fill us. It is at once thrilling and terrifying. But we must come - because not to come is to continue in living death.
