What Do You Want?

"How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord Almighty! My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God" (Psalm 84:1-2). What do you want? How would you answer this question if it was popped on you randomly? Pause your listening or reading and ponder this question for a while. Before you carry on, wonder about it again. Confession time! I get irritated with stories in which a character immediately knows the answer to such a question. Or, if some conference speaker infers that we ought to know. For myself, I find it depends on the day and its circumstances. I'm not sure if there is one thing that I know I want. Most of us are not so fully in tune with our hearts as to always have an answer ready. But knowing what we want is important. Consider what G. K. Chesterton once wrote, "Every person who knocks on the door of a brothel is looking for God." The only difference between that person and the one who kneels to receive the Lord's Supper is that the former is looking for satisfaction in the wrong place. The former does not know that it is God who is being sought for. It's the same with all our appetites and longings: a bigger house; a faster car; better make-up; successful children; political position. We want many things. The thing is getting these things doesn't satisfy. In fact, they tend to kill us. We humans have an infernal habit of mistaking the things God gives for the God who gives them. We want the creations rather than the creator. It is easier for us to worship the things God gives rather than their Maker. As Paul once wrote, "They exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshipped and served created things rather than the Creator-who is forever praised! Amen" (Romans 1:25). God made everything for His glory, to show off His greatness. For God, that is not egotistical; it is just true. His glory puts everything in perspective. The things He created all point back to Him. They remind us that He is our true home, our destination. Sin is wanting the signs, the created stuff. Sin is making the signs our home rather than God to whom they point. Worshipping God's creation will be our death. The psalmist knew this. He was away from Jerusalem and longed to be home. Not because he worshipped that city but because in Jerusalem was God's temple. The temple represented God's presence on earth. It was the symbol of God's presence; that is where he encountered God. That was her joy. This is even truer for us, followers of Jesus. God's house is Christ Himself and we, the church, are his body. God is right here, where we are. But do we want him? Is he our joy? What do you want? The psalmist answer is simple: to be with God. If that is what we want to want, how do we shift our wanting from created things to the creator? There is no 'one size fits all' answer to this. We are all on the journey either towards or away from God. For today, consider this: our spiritual practices (things like communal worship, prayer, scripture, giving) are not ends in themselves. They are meant to be means through which we draw close to God, means by which are "wants" are changed. So, use them well! Also, this: Jesus suggests that our prayers should not be too long. Many Christian traditions encourage short prayers prayed regularly. Rooted in this psalm, make such a prayer, and offer it several times a day.