OK, so you may be get tired of me writing about the desire that God has for us. For some reason, I just can't get it out of my mind. I believe that God wants to do a work deep in my soul, so the Spirit is camping out a lot on this issue in my "thinking" time.

I was listening to a speaker (Andy Stanley filling in for his dad on In Touch) talk about our appetites this morning - our appetite for more, more, more. He pushed beyond the obvious of appetite for food, and moved to our appetite for power, position, sex, things, shoes, acceptance, love, ______, etc. (fill in the blank with a whole bunch of things).

He went on to say that some of these appetites (or desires if you want to call is something else) are God created and Satan distorted. Our distorted appetites never whisper, they always scream. Our appetites never say "wait", they always say "now". Our appetites will make us do crazy and apparently unintelligent things (refer to Esau selling his birthright for a bowl of stew in Genesis 25). I would also say suggest that appetites always promise more that they will deliver.

How true....and troubling. Troubling in that all these appetites draw me away from God instead of to Him.

There is competition for my appetite. The psalmist implored me in Psalm 34 to "taste and see that the Lord is good". He implores me to fill my appetite by tasting Him and His ways. Unfortunately, I fill that appetite in so many other ways that are SO subtle, that often I don't even realize that I am using them to fill me.

How this must grieve the heart of God. How I must grieve the heart of God. His STRONG desire for me, to fill me, to be with me, to love me, to grow me, to perfect me, to be for me; and I use a cheap substitute and trade away what God has for me for a short term pleasure.

I have to set a watch on this area. It is SO easy to be controlled by distorted appetites. Satan desires me to be controlled by them! God desires to have me; He desires to give me fullness of life. I must be diligent in watching for ANYTHING that keeps me from being drawn to him - any attitude, any action, any word, any thought - and root it out of my life so that the Spirit of God can fill me.