I Want To Want To . . . .

Philippians 2:13 "For it is God who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose."

It is my heart's desire to please God. I want nothing more than to know Him and live a life that is worthy of His love for me. That's it. Like Moses - face to face with Him. That's all I want.

At least I think I do. I mean . . . I really want to want to.

There's the problem. I want to want to love Him more than I do. I want to want to live a life that is holy and pure before Him, more than I do. I have a desire to desire Him more deeply. I have a longing to long for Him more passionately.

I came across a passage from a book by Charles Spurgeon that really touched my heart regarding this. In it he said,

“When I was seeking the Lord, I not only believed that I could not pray without divine help, but I felt that in my very soul that I could not. I could not feel as acutely, or even mourn or groan as I would have. I longed to long more after Christ, but I could not even feel that I needed Him as I ought to have felt it. This heart was then as hard, as adamant, and as dead as those that rot in their graves. Oh, what I would, at times have given for a tear. I wanted to repent, but I could not. I longed to believe, but I could not. I felt bound, hampered, and paralyzed.”

I know exactly what he's talking about - and I’m sure that many of you do as well. You see your sin, you hate it, but you don’t hate it to the point of tears. You don't hate it to death. You long to have a deeper sense of your own unworthiness and a greater sense of the love of Christ. You would love to love Him more.

This is an extremely important desire to have, as it is the necessary first step to a true conversion. God is not interested in taking what you have and building upon it – for the simple reason that what you have is not worth building upon. We bring nothing to the table of salvation and healing. And the sooner we truly understand that, the sooner we will be healed. God is in the ‘new creation’ business. He is not interested in cleaning your filthy rags. He wants to give you new clothing – to robe you in the righteousness of Christ. Jesus is in the garment industry, not the tailoring industry.

And just as we cannot bring healing upon ourselves, we also cannot even bring the desire to be healed. It is God who draws men to Himself. In Philippians 2:13 we read that “It is God who works in you to will and to act according to His purpose.”

We cannot even bring the will to be healed into our hearts. God must bring the will and the healing. The ramifications of understanding this are huge:it totally affects how I pray. I put myself before God, and in tears, I cry for tears. In my heart of hearts, I plead for a greater will to have a greater desire to pursue Him above all things. I also pray for my unsaved friends differently. I pray for the will to be placed in their hearts to seek Him. If you think about it, that's a huge difference from how we normally pray for them.

My longing for Him comes from Him. That blows my mind - so I'll just accept it and rest in it and pray for Him to increase that longing, the longing that I can't conjure up in my mind. The will that is not naturally within me to seek Him.