You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you might find...

...you get what you need!

Here is the most classic mistake that I have made, and that I try to help others avoid making--using God to (try to) change your circumstances instead of using your circumstances to better know God.

I spent years and years and years, and years, frustrated, angry, and depressed because I couldn't get God to do what I wanted Him to do.

Yes, I was a Christian. Yes, I was faithful to go to church and to tithe and to read my Bible and to pray. I stayed in fellowship and served and did ALL the things that we are supposed to do as Christians in order to be healthy and obedient. And I did them a lot! But my faith never worked. Why did it not work??? Well, for the answer to that question, we will go to the Bible. Galatians 5 states that faith works through love. So, the logical answer then, would be that I did not have love. If faith works through love, and my faith was not working, then it must be that I did not have love, or at least, enough love.

And so it was. As the years went by, and I grew and changed I eventually saw it. My main concern in life was my quality of life. That is what I focused on, and that is what I thought God's role was in human affairs--to make our lives better.

So I begged, I pleaded, I worked really hard. I flew myself around the country and the world trying to do the things that I thought were necessary to get Him to fix my life. And guess what happened? Not only did it not get better...it got worse!!!

Well, you can imagine my disappointment. Here I was doing all of the things that I thought a person was supposed to do to fix his life and get his act together, and none of it was working! What was I to do??? More of the same, but even harder???

Well, fortunately, God has ways of getting our attention. And pain is one of the best. The pain factor got so high that not only did it become extremely unattractive to keep on doing the same things I had been doing, it actually became impossible. My house of cards fell down. KABOOM!!!

That certainly got my attention. When you are not only uninspired to do things, but actually unable to do them, you are forced to do something else. So I did. And then, wonder of wonders, and miracle of miracles, guess who started to show up in my life? No, not Ed McMahon and the Prize Patrol...God! Yes folks, God Himself began to show up on the scene.

And let me tell you, THAT was a surprise. I wasn't even tithing, and yet here God was showing up in my life! Nor was I attending church regularly. I was still reading my Bible and praying, although not in the same manner that I used to. And here was God. Real and living, God.

Well, that was my first clue. Things sure must be different than I have thought for most of my adult life! And different they were! It is hard to describe how different things began to look.

Fast forward a few years, after learning many lessons from this real God who had decided to show up in my life. There I am sitting in the car in front of my house with a good friend of mine, and we are talking about God, as we always do. I do not remember very well what specific things the conversation is about, but somehow or other it comes around to this. "What if God exists primarily to be loved?"

Now, I am not privy to everything that happens in the spiritual dimension, but I like to think, that at that very moment, in the heavens, time stood still, all movement ceased, and an infinite silence reigned. Nothing moved; every gear ground to a halt, every passage of energy ceased, and every being that was in activity stopped to listen. All was still and grey, and the very spiritual essence of the universe stood perfectly still, waiting. The universe and it's Maker watched and listened.

There I sat in my friend's car. We finished our conversation, I got out and walked toward the house, and he drove off. And one thought reigned uppermost in my mind. What IF God existed primarily to be loved??? What IF that was why He existed in the first place??? What IF that was actually why He created human beings in the first place??? What if that was what He wanted from us more than anything else??? What if...what if God's primary reason for existence, and mine as well, was simply... friendship and love?

So, as the stars bent their ears down to listen and closed their eyes in anticipation, and as the winds that blow the Spirit slowed and stilled, and as all Creation held its breath, I decided. "God," I said, "I'm sorry that I have always viewed you as simply someone who exists to do stuff for me. I am going to change. I am going to begin relating to you as a person, a real person who can be known and whose primary reason for existence is love and friendship. I am going to be your friend."

And the winds again began to blow. The stars returned to their shining, the wheels began to spin once more, the Spirit began to move, and all of Creation resumed its course. But there was one small part of the universe that was spinning and moving in a new and different direction--my spirit. And, as we have previously discussed, when you begin to move in a different direction, things begin to look totally different than they have!

Oh, the difference. The difference between these two approaches to life with God is so vast, that it cannot adequately be described with words. Nevertheless, I am going to try! The one keeps you in a box, with walls that continuously move inward, squeezing more and more of the life out of you; the other opens up the universe to be explored. The one will turn you into a living, breathing example of myopia, while the other will allow you to personify the words of Jesus, who stated, "He who believes in me, out of His innermost being will flow rivers of living water." (John 7:38) The one helps you to create your own prison, and to constantly reinforce the walls with steel, brick, and mortar; the other sets you as free as the Holy Spirit Himself, Who IS freedom!

And it's really not so surprising. Jesus said it Himself when He stated, "He who seeks to save His life will lose it, but he who loses his life for My sake will find it." The interesting part here is that He didn't say, "...but he who loses his life will find it." No, He said, "...he who loses his life FOR MY SAKE will find it." That means that we have to not only give up on all of those things that we think we want and need, but we also have to come to Him. TO HIM. THE REAL PERSON. Because He is, after all, a real person! One that can be known, just the way you can know any other real person! And in that RELATIONSHIP...I say it again for emphasis...in that RELATIONSHIP WITH THE REAL PERSON, JESUS CHRIST...we will find our lives!

And not only did Jesus say it, but God Himself said it about a million other times in the Bible. "You shall have no other gods before ME!" Not even the god of a life that looks like you think it should look!

Well, after this turning point, life became alive. I became alive. I am not sure what the heck I had before this point... it kinda sorta LOOKED like a life, but it was not really life! I still liked a lot of the same things, music, foods, places, etc., but how even those things took on new meaning and purpose!

Becoming alive, after you have been...dead?...even as a Christian, is an amazing experience, to say the least. And where does it come from??? Well, the Bible was right--it comes from love! And love can only be found in one place, in all of creation. There is only one place in all of God's huge, amazing creation that love can be found. Only one. And that place is---relationship! Oh,the logic of it all! Of course! How can you have love if there is no one to receive love from or to give it to??? Love, by its very nature, requires another to be the recipient! You cannot love if you have no one TO love or to be loved by!

And boy does your faith work when you discover love. Perfectly, no, because we, none of us, know how to love perfectly. But imperfect love is better than no love. To be learning to love, and to be loved, (which itself is a vast concept to explore!), is MUCH better than not loving at all!!!