One Thing We Should Want

I was on the phone talking to my friend who is also a real estate agent handling the sale of our house. He stopped me short when you he said, "...it's what you wanted." I just finished giving a list of things that have gone wrong, almost surreal as if in a strange dream I can't escape.

Understandably moving, selling the house, finding an apartment in New York, learning a new job would be challenging but there are moments that I long for a day of reprieve. Just to catch my breath and rest.

I think of the man in the store doing our kitchen counter estimate falling asleep...trying to get clothes out of the storage unit delivered only minutes ago and laid a few items on the grass when the sprinkler system suddenly came to life when a repair man turned it on...a broken computer system at work with the screen going blank and a program that has failed to operate...the list of repairs needed to be addressed in our prior home and the ones in the apartment that was painfully slow...leaving us a month in a hotel with a cost that skyrocketed...

Yes, I did want to obey the leading of the Lord. And so this outweighs any discomfort or trouble along the way. These moments will not last forever. Sometimes I laugh at the expression, "This too shall pass," and my response is, "or I'll just pass out!"

God asked Solomon what do you want? (1 Kings 3:5). King Solomon asked for wisdom to lead a nation. To the blind man Jesus asked, "What do you want me to do for you?" (Mark 10:51). Any one would answer Jesus with their immediate need to be satisfied.

But what if you were to respond, "I just want You, Lord!" or "I just want more of Your Presence!" And you walk away with the need or desire unmet but an overwhelming sense of peace because God is with you. Nothing outward seems to have changed, but inwardly you are different.

Through the tears, frustration, weariness still we must declare with David, "One thing I ask from the LORD, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the LORD and to seek him in his temple." (Psalms 27:4)

Above all our wants and pressing needs. We must desire Him more and more!