Taking every thought captive for obedience to Christ (2 Corinthians 10.5)

The Question
What does God want most of all for you (1)?
I suspect that every Christian – if not every human being – has at some time or another, if only out of desperation, confusion, anger, or longing, cried out in his heart, “Lord, what do You want from me?”

Because we are made in the image of God, the sense of having some connection with the Deity persists, even among those who deny Him. People cannot escape the need for God, and whether they worship the God of Scripture or some god of their own devising, they will invariably seek beyond themselves, in some hope of good or glory, that fulfillment or satisfaction which they cannot deny.

This can be a frustrating quest, for Christians as much as for anyone else. Life is fraught with so many struggles, obstacles, difficulties, challenges, and trials. We experience setbacks, dashed dreams, and failed plans. Friends disappoint. We disappoint ourselves much of the time. Nothing quite seems to satisfy that deep-down sense of becoming, and so we may at times cry out to God for some clarification, redirection, or bolt out of the blue to assure us, or guide us onto the path of blessing.

What does God want for us? More specifically, what does He want most of all for us? If we could get that in our sights, it would clarify everything else. If we just could know for sure what His intentions are, then, setting our course in life by that, the struggles, trials, disappointments, and setbacks wouldn’t unhorse us the way they typically do. Instead, we’d see them simply as exercises in getting our bearings and gathering strength to prepare us for the next stage of our journey.

It’s important, as we begin to address this question, that we focus on two matters. First, we want to make sure that we’re seeking an answer to the question of what God wants most of all for us. God has many specific things in mind for each of us, and for no two of us will those details look the same. We are already off on the wrong foot if we’re thinking about what God wants most of all for us by looking at others and taking our cues from what we consider to be desirable in their lives.

We want to know notwhat God has done for others, and that we hope He might also do for us. We want to know what He wants most of all for us, what’s the top priority, the ultimate objective, the guiding goal or directive that, as we attain it, will make sense of everything elsein our lives. This, we can be certain, is the same for every person. What God wants most of all for me is the same as what He wants most of all for you, for all your friends, neighbors, and colleagues, and for everyone who’s ever lived.

God wants you to know Him.

But, in order to see clearly to this top priority, we’ll need to address a few lesser issues – personal hopes or misconceptions – that you or others might cling to in seeking the answer to this question.

The second matter to keep in mind is in the preposition for: We’re hoping to discover not what God wants of you, or from you, but what God wants most of all for you. The difference is important.

Many people hold to some form of the mistaken idea that God somehow needs us. That He needs us to do something for Him, or to be or offer something to Him. Any god who needs anything at all from me is not a god to be worshiped. He is a god to be pitied.

In fact, God needs nothing from anybody. He needs nothing from me, nothing from you, nothing from the greatest or holiest people who have ever lived or ever will live, nothing from the world, and nothing from the future. God needs nothing from outside Himself in order to know and experience the fullness of what it means to be God. God is complete in Himself – whole, entire, fulfilled, satisfied, joyful, and sufficient. He is God, and God does not require propping up, reinforcing, assistance, aid, or “‘at-a-boys” of any kind from anything or anyone outside Himself.

So we’re not asking about what God wants of you or from you. That, of course, is not to say that God does not hold out expectations, offer instructions, or issue commandments relative to you and your experience in the world. Rather, it is to insist that all such matters as these can only be rightly understood and gladly undertaken from within the framework of knowing what God wants most of all for you.

Get that right. Let the knowledge of what God wants mostof all for you settle into your soul, and whatever God may require of you within that context will be for you nothing other than your greatest delight, your most earnest pursuit, and your highest satisfaction and joy.

OK, but Who is this God, and why should we care about the fact that He wants anything for us at all?

We’ll look at that question next Sunday. For now, let’s review the week of offerings at The Fellowship of Ailbe website, just in case you missed anything.

Weekly Review
Central to life in the Kingdom economy of God is the practice of justice. This week’s ReVision series was Part 8 of our 10-part series, The Kingdom Economy. We saw that justice, according to the Law of God, is a gem with five facets, and it is the calling of every Kingdom citizen, not just of the courts. You can download the weekly PDF of this week’s study by clicking here.

This week our Crosfigell columns anchored us in the love God has for us, in order to spur us on toward the coming day of judgment by striving violently to enter more deeply into the Kingdom of God. You can read the three installments of this week’s Crosfigell columns by clicking here.

Luke lingers over the launching and establishment of the Gospel in Ephesus in week 17 of our study in the book of Acts. From small beginnings, great expansion of the Kingdom issues from Paul’s work in Asia. You can download Week 17 in our study of Acts by  clicking here and scrolling all the way down.

In Thursday’s The Week installment, we saw what happens when Christian leaders get their priorities out of whack. Those leaders who today are supporting Donald Trump are the same ones who denounced and cried out for the impeachment of Bill Clinton in the 1990s. Are we to conclude that character doesn’t matter after all?

Saturday’s In the Gates column continues our examination of how the Law of God comes to occupy primacy of place in our soul, in particular, in the conscience. We’re in the First Things section of our study on The Rule of Law, and we’re still working at making sure the Law of God is gaining entrance and footing in our minds, hearts, and consciences.

Visit our website and bookstore to discover additional resources and publications to help you in your walk with and work for the Lord. Subscribe to more of our instructional newsletters. Read John Nunnikhoven’s daily Voices Together column. And while you’re at the website, watch the videos introducing our Men’s Prayer Movement and offering you an opportunity to assess the state of your Christian worldview.

T. M. Moore

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