Living with Desire..SUCKS!...but It's Living...

i've been doing a lot of thinking about "desire" lately. being a person that god graciously called back into existence...awakening the heart...has meant having to "deal" with the essence of humanity known as "desire". most of us learn to kill off desire so that we aren't disappointed by life, or we learn to feed it with lesser pleasures (we suck the life out of people/things trying to convince ourselves that it's making it all feel better). both of those responses get us no where.

BUT...i've been finding...that living with desire ain't no picnic either. it's agreeing to experience life head on...all the beauty (Yay!!)...and the pain.

so i've been begging god for some answers. i've been pissed off, been confused...but i've been real with him. (apologies to those that have noticed that in previous blogs...)

so i've been thinking up a blog about some things that i've been realizing and remembered that i'd already put some of my ponderings in an email to one of my pastors. i'll explain more about what i'm thinking when i can find better words. here goes...

hi, ryan! so it's no surprise that i've been doing a TON of pondering about desire and my frustrations with it (and God). ;) and i think i've been having some realizations...the first one was confirmed in bible study this morning on page 13 of the desire book. "we must listen to desire, look at it carefully, let it guide us through the false routes and dead ends."

i think i have been getting so riled up by the discomfort associated with desire...reacting to it...rather than listening to it. i'm guessing that each time the message could be different. sometimes it reveals a falsehood. maybe other times there are directions...encouragements to risk, move ahead, etc. this last one has been allowing a huge inaccuracy to be revealed as to how i view god in some of my places of desire. the ramifications of the 'if-then' god...my pride, strangely, gives me permission to then hold god to expectations...oh dear...but it also feeds an "i'm worth being used...and that's exactly what he's up to" message about god. yowza...but so eye-opening. heart-opening, actually. :)

so...learning to listen to the messages of the rumblings...rather than being so quick to satiate them, point blame, kill them...

i'm guessing that desire is actually one of the finest gifts aside from relationship (with god). it's a way that we can tap into him...the real him...if we will listen long enough. hmm...

what do you think?

-s