Heart’s Desires Part I

Psalm 37:4 says “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart”.

Sorry, am I reading this right? Does anyone else get a little uncomfortable when they read this? Is it possible that God (…. that’s the one that breathed the universe into existence) would love me so much as to give me the desires of my heart? Now, I’ve heard this verse explained in two different ways.

Firstly, I’ve heard it said that when you delight yourself in Him he will give you whatever you want. A lot of people conveniently leave out the ‘delight in Him’ part, and read it as “God will give you whatever you want”. Those same people go on to say (excuse my hyperbole for a second) “Give me 10 cars, a house and a beautiful wife”… then they purpose their hearts in the pursuit of those things. For me, that’s kind of missing the mark. The end result of this is either a) we get the stuff and become filled with pride or b) we don’t get the stuff and blame God when it goes wrong.

The second interpretation of this verse I’ve heard is something that seems more fitting for the God I know. As we purpose ourselves to follow Him, he creates desires in our hearts. So what would be an example of this in my life? As I spend time getting to know God (through the bible, praise, prayer and in community with other Christians) He’s revealing more and more the injustice in the world, and creating a desire to do something about them. My first step in all of this (as I come to terms with the life-long implications of this) is to start blogging about these things… violence against women, pornography and sexualisation, human trafficking, global poverty. I believe as we get to know God, he aligns our hearts to his, points out the things that are wrong and plants a desire to change them in His name. So, God is literally giving our hearts desire.

So, if the second interpretation is correct, which is what I’m thinking about at the moment, would God then fulfill the desires that he puts there? If He’s teaching me about injustice, would He then equip me to do something about it, or just leave it as a nice thought in my mind? That definitely doesn’t seem like the God that I know…