Jesus has been messing me up for the past couple of days. I've been focusing so much on how, as people, we have this desire to feel wanted. Rather you're an introvert or extrovert, male or female, theology major or psychology major, in school or out of school, we all have this over whelming desire to feel wanted. Unfortunately, most of the time we feel unwanted even if we are surrounded by people that do want us. We have this perception of how it looks when someone wants us and when that vision isn't met, we automatically shut down and believe no one wants us at all or at least I do. For an introvert (because I am one) example, do any of you know of someone and you know you would make awesome friends but you don't talk to them and they don't talk to you so your automatic thought is that they don't what to be your friend at all? If you said no to that question, you're lying and you need to go repent. My point is we think no one wants us at all because our perception of being wanted isn't met, but God blows our perception of being wanted out of the water and we ignore it.
This statement hit me like a train at 2:30am this past Saturday. I was at an event called All Night Prayer put on by a college ministry here in Cleveland. We were taking communion and scenes from The Passion of the Christ were playing on a screen that was in the front of the sanctuary. As I'm cringing at the site of the crucifixion, a thought came across my mind. Jesus did not die on the cross for me to focus on being wanted by other people. Are we not worth more than the thoughts of other people? At this point, I'm feeling overwhelmingly guilty and am sobbing and hyperventilating in my chair. I mean, I had already been crying through out the communion session, but I was hard core, when Mufasa died in the Lion King, sobbing. It got so bad that I went to the back of the sanctuary, dropped to my knees, sobbed, and prayed for a good 45 minutes. After I got done praying, I stood up and worshipped. As I stood there, I heard the Lord say, "It's okay to want to be wanted. It's okay to have a desires. It's not okay to want that more than you want Me." That's when it hit me (after I doubled over and sobbed again), God wants us more than anyone on this planet could ever or ever will want us. He wants us to have the desires of our hearts, but our desires are not more important than the God who gave us those desires.
Have you ever thought about how much God focuses in on us? Do you realize everything was made to praise God? The wind. The rain. Lightning. Insects. Birds. Lions. Everything. Everything was made to praise the Lord, and yet, He doesn't focus on them. I'm sure God enjoys and loves to hear the praises of everything He has created, but He focuses on us. We are more important than all of His creations. He hears our groans of pain. He hears our cheers of joy. He is constantly working and making everything out for our good and working on giving us the desires of our hearts in His timing. Don't let your desires be more important than the Creator who gave you those desires.
