How Do I Know What I Really Want?
Here, then, is the desire, still wandering and uncertain of its object and still largely unable to see that object in the direction where it really lies.
Thus opens the next section in The Weight of Glory, by C.S. Lewis, which I am using as a guide for an exploration of the idea of ‘holy desires’, the fuel of a Christian Rebel’s life.
By the grace of God, every human is born into the world with a Desire nothing in this world can satisfy. We are always longing for Something, and it’s only through the new birth that we enter into the other world, where that Something is found. But even then, there remains a potential for confusion on what we actually want. Besides the one Desire that C.S. Lewis talks about in The Weight of Glory, there are also many other good desires, and, what’s even more of a problem, there are also some that do not even deserve the good name of desire, and would be better be described by the word ‘greed’.
For as long as we live in these bodies, our greeds will be with us.
Here’s a list of those I have found in my own life:
a greed for self-importance (rather than contentment and gratitude with the immense dignity and significance God has already given me as an unmerited gift: my identity as a human and as a redeemed child of God);
a greed for self-secured safety (rather than just doing my best to behave responsibly and then simply trust in Him who holds all things in His hand, and who has promised me eternal security);
a greed for self-justification (rather than accepting the reality of both my natural inadequacy and the supernatural holiness and acceptability that I am given as an unearned gift from God);
a greed for self-acquired authority, power and influence (rather than the happy acceptance of the reality of my subordination & servanthood, and the responsible wielding of the powers God has entrusted me with as His delegate);
a greed for self-centred pleasure (rather than the humble enjoyment of God’s good gifts within the rightful and healthy ways He has designed for them to be enjoyed).
All those can be summarized as an all-encompassing greed for self-centred comfort, which I feel compelled to seek and secure for myself by selfishly using people, things and circumstances for this end.
This is in full-on opposition with the other-focused, self-giving love that is a chief characteristic of the Spirit of God.
This is how Scripture describes this opposition, through the words of the Apostle Paul in the letter to the Galatians: “the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh”. (Galatians 5:17).
Through no fault of my own I am born in this world with this flesh, the part of my nature whose main trait is the greed I was talking about. That is unfortunate. But happily that’s not the end of the story! Besides the Greed, I am born with the Desire, lots of other good desires, and the freedom to choose which to persevere in and continue to follow.
The overall result is that, no matter what, life will not be easy – but life can be good, because of the provision God has made for us through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Our trust in His work brings in our life the very presence of His Holy Spirit. And the Apostle Paul shows us how to avoid self-destruction and how to pursue the good life, in the same chapter of Galatians:
You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.
So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.
‘Walk by the Spirit’ – that is how I get to know what I really want, that is how my holy desires grow, that is how I get nearer and nearer to the ultimate object of my Desire & the ultimate, utterly satisfying, and inexhaustible source of comfort and significance.
Action is needed, one step in front of the other, and the One to follow is the Spirit of God.
Here we again run into a problem that arises from our being, for now, ‘in the flesh’ – meaning, this time, our present unrenewed bodies: the Spirit’s direction is not always easy to perceive. He is not directly accessible to us through our senses. Praise the Lord, then, for the Scriptures! The Spirit worked over a long period of time through and with people whose hearts’ desire was to follow and respond to Him, and created writings that have reached to us across the ages.
If we want to get an image of what we’re called to be after, there’s no better place to go searching than Scripture. Because, as Lewis says, ‘the scriptural imagery has authority. It comes to us from writers who were closer to God than we, and it has stood the test of Christian experience down the centuries’.
He also warns us, though, that what Scripture teaches us to yearn for, might, at the beginning, not feel all that inspiring! Lewis says:
The natural appeal of this authoritative imagery is to me, at first, very small. At first sight it chills, rather than awakes, my desire. And that is just what I ought to expect. If Christianity could tell me no more of the far-off land than my own temperament led me to surmise already, then Christianity would be no higher than myself. If it has more to give me, I must expect it to be less immediately attractive than “my own stuff”.
But as I already mentioned in a previous post, thank God, increased desire is one of the rewards of obedience. The more I ‘walk in the Spirit’, aligning my attitudes and actions to His, as revealed in the Bible, the more I desire to do so.
In Galatians 5:22-23, the Apostle Paul describes the result of ‘keeping in step with the Spirit’ as a miraculous fruit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. This wonderful fruit whets our holy appetites even further and opens our eyes to further see along the way. This fruit is in its turn a seed of holy desires, and it sustains us on the way towards the ‘far-off land’, towards the Home where our ultimate Desire will be quenched.
And what shall we find when we get there? When I looked again at Lewis’s list in The Weight of Glory, I did a double take: he counts out five promises of Scripture, and to my surprise I saw how they map onto and counteract the five ‘greeds’ I listed earlier!! That is because the greeds are merely the corruptions of five good and holy desires, which have their fulfillment in our final reunification with Christ. 😊💕
Here they are, in the order given by Lewis:
Our desire for security and safety will be fulfilled by us being ‘with Christ’; our desire to be right, to be justified – by the fact that ‘we shall be like Him’; our desire for dignity and significance – by the fact that ‘we shall have “glory”’; our desire for pleasure – by the fact that ‘we shall, in some sense, be fed or feasted or entertained’, and our desire for rightful authority and empowerment – by the fact that ‘we shall have some sort of official position in the universe – ruling cities, judging angels, being pillars of God’s temple’. Isn’t that amazing? 💗
I think these promises fulfill not only those five good needs and desires, but actually many more, and I think we will come to understand more of the significance of Scripture’s promises as we continue our walk of obedience with Christ… and their full meaning probably only at the moment when they will finally be realized at His return.
I hope this continued exploration of the holy desires God has given us is bringing you renewed inspiration and enthusiasm for your daily walk with Jesus! Let me know what you think in the comments.
