Man's Deepest Needs

It is interesting how God designed man, but allowed the fall of man.  It is interesting how fallen man has only one focus.  It is really interesting how God structured life to where fallen man has only One Who can meet his deepest needs, and at some point fallen man can turn to God and have all those deepest needs met.  Read how Michael so simply and succinctly puts all this into perspective!

He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, 'From his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water.’ --John 7:38

Jesus knew who He was, where He came from, where He was going, who His Father was, and that all of His friends were going to deny Him. What was His response? He picked up a towel and washed the disciples’ feet! The behavior of others did not determine His actions. This is true freedom, the freedom from the actions of others. How many of us have our actions predetermined by others and, in effect, are not living life but merely responding to it?   

           

Being physically born from below, our life initially centers on the things of the earth.We look to another to meet our spiritual desires, desires that only God can meet, such as the affirmation of worth, acceptance, security, love, and commitment. We then find that this other first wants us to meet his or her needs. We are--as one lady said at a conference--two ticks with no dog! We then become angry and bitter toward the mate, the friend, the pastor, or the child. However, the anger does not stop there. We begin to hate ourselves for needing others’ love and acceptance before getting on with life. We hate having our mood controlled by the glance of another, the casual unkind word, the lack of interest in what we do, and the subtle hints at our inferiority. In short, we hate ourselves for not being free. We find ourselves under the control of others, slaves with hats in hand begging for our daily allotment of acceptance, security, and assurance. We hate what we have become: emotional leeches. We want to believe that others have created our feelings of inner ill will and misery; however, we know they have not; they have only revealed them.

           

Are you attempting to drink at a well that holds no water for your inner man? Do you look to your boss, your mate, or your parents, begging them to give what they do not possess? If so, then you have received the misery that you deserve. The end result is not only hatred toward those who fail at being God for you but also hatred toward yourself for being in such a pathetic situation. Anything that you make out to meet your deepest needs is a god, albeit a false god, that in the end must fail you.

We see today many who have made government god, demanding from it the things that God would give. As is normal for the carnality of man, they selfishly demand that god (government) intervene in everyone’s life but their own, in order that others might be forced to meet their needs by not intruding on their comfort zone. However, nothing will meet the deepest longings of the heart except Jesus, who meets those needs and has structured life in such a way that no other can. Once disillusionment with all other sources of true love and acceptance has occurred, people can look only to God to meet the deep needs. He made each one of us for Himself, and in Him we all must find life. The answer, as always in the deep Christian life, is for the simple and the weak. Those who have lost the strength to pull the world toward them or drag themselves toward it may humbly say, “I have a God. His name is Jesus, and He meets all my needs.”

           

We are not to desire to be lottery Christians, those who would buy spiritual lottery tickets to obtain in an instant what others have gained through a process. A lottery Christian wants to gain the fruit and maturity of spiritual men and women without going through the process of having doctrine, people, mates, teachers, vocations, or places fail them. God is not making mushroom believers but oaks. One is immediate; the other is a lifetime in the making. To discover that the world does not meet our needs is not a pleasant experience and normally takes some time. 

One last point is that upon discovering, believing, and experiencing that Christ meets every need of man, we do not then withdraw from man. On the contrary, we are driven to man, but with a much different attitude. We do not run to others begging for life, but our desire is to impart to them some essence of the Life we receive. 

Many years ago I heard a preacher say this: “Roses are red, violets are blue.  And my disposition depends on you.  AND WHEN IT DOES, I am in trouble!”  Crazy, isn’t it?!?  And way too many people, both Christians and not, live day by day with this idea hanging over their heads.

“Two ticks with no dog!”  Two people struggling to get “the other” to meet their needs.  Hopeless.  Helpless.  And yet, the “ticks” seem to never find their “dog” they are longing for!

This day’s writing is worth spending a lot of time wrestling with each sentence, asking God to open the truths within each.  And asking God to get “me” to the point of “true freedom, the freedom from the actions of others,” and to the point of “the simple and the weak.  Those who have lost the strength to pull the world toward them or drag themselves toward it.”  And then to “humbly say, ‘I have a God.  His name is Jesus, and He meets all my needs.’ “  Well, amen.