I’ve been listening to Jeremy Camp in my car this past week, and one song in particular spoke to me. “My Desire” expresses how I feel about my life and my God. I want my life to be real. I want to set aside all of my pride and embrace humility. I want my life to have purpose, the purpose that God has set before me. I want to be free. This song provides the means for achieving all these goals and desires: “lay it all down before the King.”
You want to be real
You want to be empty inside
You want to be someone laying down your pride
You want to be someone someday
Then lay it all down before the King
You want to be whole
You want to have purpose inside
You want to have virtue and purify your mind
You want to be set free today
Then lay it all down before the King
Without Jesus, it is impossible to be completely real because a part of me would always be false. Without the King of kings, it is impossible to be whole because He is an essential piece of my being. Without the Christ, it is impossible to set aside pride because He grants humility and shines His light on the pride deep within my heart. Without the Lord, it is impossible to be whole because He is what completes me. Without His Holy Spirit, it is impossible to have virtue and a pure mind because He reveals that which must be washed away by the blood of the lamb.
On our own, we can try to find purpose, to be humble, to be virtuous. But in the end all we will end up with is an inferior purpose, pride in our ability to achieve that purpose, and a mind corrupted by the world that applauds that purpose. I’ve tried things on my own and found less than what I truly desire. I was left empty, but not in the way I desire to be or in the way Camp refers to in this song.
Life without Jesus is an endless striving for more, a reaching for something to fill us up. We must be emptied of all that is worldly so that we might be filled with His love, mercy, grace, and compassion. We must let go of what we think we desire so that He might place in our hearts a greater desire to be a blessing in this world for His sake.
What is your desire? Do you seek to find what God’s purpose is for you? Do you desire to be set free? Then lay all your life, all your love, all your sins, all your pain, all your struggles, all your striving down before the King. He will give you the desires of your heart.
Trust in the LORD and do good;
dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture.
Delight yourself in the LORD
and he will give you the desires of your heart.
Psalm 37:3-4 (NIV)