A Streetcar Named...

As of late I have been listening to a reading of the book "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis. I highly recommend it to any thinking person, Christian and non-Christian alike. My only exposure to Lewis before this has been through quotes or snippets, and the movies based on his Narnia books, which I'm sure don't do his written works justice in comparison.

That said, one part of the thought train in his book discusses the impulses we had, and how no impulse on it's own is "good" or "bad", but it is what we do with that impulse that takes on such a characteristic. Now that the statement and following discussion has had a chance to churn around in my brain a bit, I feel the urge to write about it.

Looking back on my life before I was born again by the Spirit of God, or became a new creation, or came to Christ, or whatever phrase you like, I can see the perversion of my impulses, or desires, quite clearly.

Take for example, the desire for sex. A beautiful thing designed for husbands and wives to create children and be a wonderful expression of love for one another. Perverted it became in my own life a desire in my heart for sex with countless women so easily available through the Internet, in solely self gratifying ways that completely betray the natural design and haven't the slightest to do with love.

For another example, take the desire for play. I like to play video games, or should I say more accurately, one video game at a time that I get really into. Fine for a hobby that is in balance with the more important things of life, allowing my brain to shut off for a while. But many times in the past such games consumed my life -- so much so that early on in my marriage I ignored my wife in the real world to battle goblins in a false one.

Or for yet another example, take the desire for bonding with one's children. I absolutely did this when my children were much littler. So much so that they became false idols in my life. I justified it, as men typically do of their actions when they think they are right (and sometimes when they are not), but the fact was there were things in my life that were ignored for the sake of otherwise good intent run amuck.

These are just a few examples from my own life, but you can apply this concept of excess to just about anything.

The desire to work hard is not a bad thing in itself, unless hard work turns into an obsession that trumps family and friends.

The desire to sleep is not a bad thing in itself, unless it makes a person lazy and negligent of his/her responsibilities.

The desire for food is not a bad thing in itself, unless it turns a person into a glutton or a bad steward wasting enormous sums on "fine dining".

The desire for comfort is not a bad thing in itself, unless it blocks a person's ability to be a comforter to others.

The desire for freedom is not a bad thing in itself, unless the fight for freedom is what enslaves a person.

The desire for protection is not a bad thing in itself, unless it makes a person too fearful to step out into new territory to help a fellow soul.

The desire for approval is not a bad thing in itself, unless it turns a person into a mere people pleaser, vain and shallow.

The desire for long life is not a bad thing in itself, unless long life becomes the end goal instead of a gift to be used in service to God and others.

Need I go on? I think not! The point is clear -- our desires are things to be directed and measured out with thought, not released without rhyme or reason so that we run from one to the other, trying to fill with something else a hole that only God can fill.

And that brings me to a desire I have not yet mentioned. There are many, but I speak of one specifically. That is a desire for God, and God IS the end goal, not a means to something else. When we seek fulfillment through any other desire, we don't find it, because only God can give us fulfillment. When we seek fulfillment through a desire for God, we will find it, because he is what can fill the hole inside of us that we may not even realize is there.

Mind you, I did not say a desire for God "stuff" -- I said a desire for God himself. We can exhaust ourselves forcing the study of his Word, volunteering at church, witnessing to people, teaching here, giving there, and so on. Forcing work "for God" I think is a sign of a wrong approach and a wrong desire. Maybe we secretly, even unknowingly, desire the self-satisfaction of meeting our own moral standard. Or maybe it is the approval of others. Or maybe it is because we think it is our "Christian duty". I stand guilty of all of these, hands down. But I know in my mind, and I hope and pray that it makes it to my heart and sticks, that the only desire I should encourage unchecked growth of is the desire for God himself.

Praise God for Jesus Christ, the one who saves us from our sins and thus ourselves when we put our faith in him. It is he that opens the way for the Spirit of God to come live in us and rekindle a desire for God that would otherwise lay dormant and be trampled on by our own self indulgence.