Desperate and Never Satisfied

We’re never truly satisfied, but we’re so easily distracted. And sometimes being distracted feels just a little bit like what we think being satisfied would feel like. And so we go on believing that maybe what we’re trying to be satisfied by will actually satisfy us, if not today, then someday. So we keep praying that the job, the marriage, the kids, the house, the approval, the addictions will satisfy us. But it never happens. We still feel desperate.

Here’s why—God will not allow us to be satisfied by the things we think we want most. Everything leaves us empty and desperate for only One who can satisfy. It's like our hearts are pulled from birth toward God, but the world and the supernatural and even the ugliness inside of us throw all these things in the way and say, "Here's what you really want. This is what you’re looking for.” And we have this tendency to believe it every time.

We’re never satisfied, and that’s exactly how God wants it. And that challenges certain things we often believe about God. We often come to God looking for what he can do for us. And sometimes we develop this idea that God will never give us more than we can handle. We tend to believe that when we follow God, there’s nothing we can’t handle because God will never give us more than we can handle.

But think about that for a second. If we never faced anything that was more than we could handle, then we would never even need God. The Bible never tells us that God won’t allow us to go through more than we can handle. In fact the Scriptures tell us over and over again that God will allow us to go through things that reveal to us that we are desperate for God. When God allows us to face things that we can’t handle, it should cause us to cry out to God because he is our only hope.

Our desires leave us desperate. Everything we have leaves us desperate. Everything we don’t have leaves us desperate. And everything we go through leaves us desperate.

So we have to realize what it really is we’re longing for because it will never be satisfied by anything but by Jesus Christ.

What has God used in your life to reveal your desperation for him?