Desiring God's Will

Psalm 40:8
I desire to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.

It is good to desire to do the will of God - really, it should be a defining point for Christians. If we do not desire to do His will, then what really sets us apart from anyone else? So, what happens when we do not have that desire within us?

Have you ever been there? I know I have. There are times when we may want to desire to do His will, but the desire itself is not there. The world is romancing us in so many ways, and we want to be a part of the fun it has to offer. We may even know there are consequences. We know that tomorrow we will look back on wonder why we did what we did, wishing we could change it. Yet, in the heat of the moment we dive in, head-first, and find that we are drowning in the filth of this world. Or perhaps, even more dangerously, we see nothing wrong with how we live, and behave, or with that which we treasure most.

God knows this tendency is within us, and so He has thrown us a life-vest - something that can help us float on top of the junk that threatens to drown us. His Word. When we allow His Word to permeate our being, to fill our minds and affect our hearts, we will discover that we finally desire to do His will above all else. So many times we try to contrive the desire out of that which is within us, but that is impossible. To desire to do something that is contrary to our nature, we must have outside influences - we must have Christ, and we must have His Word.

My mother always said to me, and rightly so, "Junk in, junk out." When we fill our minds with all that the world has to offer, we will act and think just like everyone else - we will be no different; we will not have the mark of a disciple of Christ. Of course, the opposite is also true. If we want to be radical, yet relevant, we must be in the Word. We must let God influence our thoughts, our actions, our wants, our lives.

What are we filling our lives with? What are we allowing to influence us? Let’s think about it - think of the books we read, the magazines we flip through, the movies we watch, the TV shows we record, the games we play, the web-sites we surf, the people we go to for advice, the places we frequent - everything that can affect us in any way. And how are they affecting us, covertly shifting the attitudes and desires of our hearts? Is a change in order? Something to consider. Now, does this mean we must completely remove ourselves from the world? Absolutely not. We cannot affect the world if we are not living in it. But the world won’t desire what we have unless we stand out, and can show them how what we have - Christ - is relevant to them, right now, today. If we allow Him to affect our lives in every way, we can then affect those around us.

Is Christ relevant to you today? Is your relationship with Him making a difference in the way you live today?