What Do You Need?

Psalms 72:12 For He will deliver the needy who cry out, the afflicted who have no one to help. (v.13) He will take pity on the weak and the needy.

We serve a God who sees, understands, cares about, and is prepared to meet each individual need that each individual has. His riches of provision for us are exceeded only by His riches of love toward us. In many cases, He is simply waiting for us to bring that need to Him. He is not the bottleneck that is slowing down the answer from getting to us, but rather it is our slowness of realizing what our true need is that prevents God from providing the answer.

Although God can preemptively supply all that we require even before the need arises, and does when we reach the maturity He is leading us to, frequently He needs us to see below the surface issues that we pray about and learn to recognize the true underlying issue of the heart from which the need springs. Until we know what it is that we are actually asking for, we may not be able to recognize what He has prepared as being the answer to our needs.

Let the Spirit guide you as you read through the Word, let God's still, small voice in your heart confirm what you hear from His people, let the radiance of God shine in that corner of your heart, that compartment of your mind, that has been overshadowed by daily life, that you have often been distracted from looking into. It is not shameful or embarrassing; it is part of the human condition that we all share. Everyone of us has a corner or two where things get piled with a promise to attend to it when we get time.

When God shines His light on one of those areas, it is the time He has chosen to work through the accumulation, to give Him the things that you haven't known how to deal with or what to do with. He knows when we are ready, when we are rested enough, when He has given us the tools to work with. Having God as a working partner makes the job so much lighter. He does the heavy lifting; all we have to do is give the go-ahead. The biggest challenge we may face during the work is to repeated remind ourselves that we are identifying with God rather than with the things, the concepts, the memories, the attitudes, the view-points, the beliefs, the responses that He is transforming. Don't cling to them, cling to God and trust Him to act with love toward you.

Father God, thank You that You love to roll up Your sleeves and help us with our housecleaning. When we have been the most lax and feel overwhelmed by the magnitude of the task is when You show up and say, "Let's get this done." You respond to our needs in the very way we need the most. You make a way when there seems no way can exist. Thank you, Lord, that the task of cleansing the temple is not left up to our efforts and understanding alone.

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