One True Desire

Submitted by Jason

     Lately, the hardest thing for me is to be patient. The bible has much to say about patience and the virtue that comes with it and the blessings to be bestowed upon one who displays it. I could list several verses that contain the word patience to prove my point, but yesterday, the Lord used a verse that many Christians, including myself, know very well, to teach me about patience without that word being a part of the verse.
     That verse is Ps 37:4, "Delight thyself also in the Lord; and he shall give you the desires of thine heart.". Before I explain how the Lord used this verse to minister to me, I'd like to share the first personal experience that I had with this verse as a young believer.
     In 1994 Francie & I left our home state of New Jersey and moved to Arizona. She was 21, I was 20, and we were engaged to be married. In that same year, she conceived Kayla, I learned how to drive a truck, we got married and I gave my life to Jesus all in that year. Arizona was good to us. We lived there for over 8 yrs.
     When I became a Christian and started going to church and reading my bible, I would stumble upon scripture that I simply couldn't understand. I would bring these scriptures to the pastor and he'd help me as much as he could. Ps 37:4 was one of these scriptures.
     After about 7 years of living in Az, I was ready to move back to NJ. Francie on the other hand was not. In fact she vowed to never move back to NJ. In light of Ps 37:4, I brought the desires of my heart to the Lord. I asked him to speak to her about moving back to NJ and decided that I would not talk with her about this again. I trusted that he would fulfill his word. The only question was, "What does it mean to delight thyself in the Lord?".
     At that point, I'd been a Christian for about 7 years. I had a sincere desire to align my life with the scriptures. Somewhere along this journey, I came to realize that I had to decide whether God's word was true or not. Once I had decided that it was true, then I had to realize that it's either all true or none of it is true. Either Jesus is who he said he is and has done what he said he did or it's a fictional book.  Everything that it said that was contrary to how I lived my life had to be confronted. Something had to change. The sooner I realized that it was my life that needed to change, because God's word never changes, the better off I was.
     So, I wrestled with trying to figure out how to delight myself in the Lord, but moved forward in my Christian walk stumbling over and over. Each time I stumbled, Jesus picked me up, brushed me off and sent me on my way with a loving hand guiding me forward.
     I clung to that verse for about a year, wondering if the Lord actually cared about fulfilling his word. I felt that I was doing everything that I could to delight myself in him, but this desire of mine was being ignored.
     Sometime in 2002, Francie visited NJ to attend the wedding of one of her closest childhood friends. When she returned to Az she told me of how the Lord had spoken to her about moving back to NJ as she drove down the Atlantic City Expressway. I think I ran out of the room and started packing! So, we did just that. We moved back to NJ and spent the next 5 yrs of our lives there. I can remember thanking God for performing his word in my life by speaking to Francie about my desires, but I couldn't pinpoint where, exactly, I'd delighted myself in him.
   
     This brings me back to my original point of patience.
     Yesterday, I was thinking again of this verse. We find ourselves in a place where we wait patiently for the Lord's direction in our lives when all we want to do is get up and sprint towards his presence. Some days are easier than others. Often, I'm tempted to be discouraged on days where it seems like nothing is being accomplished.
     I've concluded that Ps 37:4 is much more about delighting yourself in the Lord than it is about receiving the desires of our hearts. As time goes on and you grow in your walk with Christ, you're desires will definitely change. The delighting part never does. Your understanding of how to delight yourself may change, but the command does not.
     For me, it has been in this continual process of delighting myself in him that I can now trust that the way that God has for me is better than any desire of mine.
     When God's will for our lives becomes our one true desire, delighting yourself in the Lord becomes an act without need of reciprocation.