A Chosen Need

Wednesday Wanderings with Dr. Sherri is a time we set aside to wander in the Presence of Jesus and ponder His truths. When you are ready, prepare your mind, body, and soul to have a transformational encounter with Jesus.

Watch the Wednesday Wanderings Welcome for this week.

Now that we have cleared our minds of the clutter, we can wander on the journey of exploring our need of God.

PREPARATION: In our last Wandering we asked the Holy Spirit to teach us the will of God and to fulfill His promises. This week we will explore a chosen and a desperate need. When you are ready, you may begin the dialogue with Jesus and state: “Jesus, I invite you to help me to leisurely wander into your Presence. Prepare my heart to receive and illuminate my spiritual senses to encounter you.”

PROMISE: Phillipians 4:19 Amplified

¹⁹ And my God will liberally supply (fill until full) your every need according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

At times I tend to prioritize and compartmentalize my needs into chosen needs and desperate needs. I prioritize my longings and choose to trust myself to take care of my physical, social, emotional, financial, and mental needs. Until a crisis arises and I need extra money or I gain extra weight and cannot fit my clothing or stress takes over, THEN I admit that I need God to step in and fix what I thought I could do.  When I’ve depleted my might, I examine which void I was attempting to meet, pray, and desperately trust God to meet my needs. No matter the initial focus, I always come back to the same result, I am spiritually deficient. This approach is redundant, reactive, and unnecessary. The truth is that God WILL supply- to capacity-ALL my (spiritual, mental, emotional, physical, social, and financial) needs if I seek and chose to rely upon Him FIRST.

PSALM: I Need Thee Every Hour written by Annie Sherwood Hawks.

I need Thee, O I need Thee;
Every hour I need Thee!
O bless me now, my Savior,
I come to Thee.

Annie Sherwood Hawks was a mother of three when she wrote the hymn I Need Thee Every Hour. Her heart song developed when in the midst of completing ordinary chores she felt overwhelmed by the Presence of God. The hymn includes the psalmist’s confession of her constant need for God in every day – in every way – in everything. The thought of an every day and every way need includes inviting God to direct us in ALL areas of our lives. Not prioritizing my spiritual needs keeps me spiritually depleted and from acknowledging that I need God everyday in every way.  When was the last time you acknowledged that you need God everyday in every way? 

PARABLE:  The reality is that whether or not we choose to acknowledge that we need God does not negate the fact that we  need God. A desperate need is when we find ourselves feeling as though we have no options and we turn to God to intervene immediately. A chosen need is when we do not wait for a desperate situation to trigger our acknowledgement of our need for God. I want to choose to come to God to fulfill the spiritual potholes within my soul BEFORE a life obstruction.

How do we develop the pro-active practice of choosing to need God in all areas of our lives?

• We come to understand that our needs can only be met through a relationship with Jesus Christ that will lead us to trust and depend on God (Proverbs 3:5).
• We prioritize and actively attend to our spiritual need for God by coming to God FIRST and trusting Him to meet everything else (Matthew 6:33).
• We surrender the illusion that anyone but God is meeting our needs (Phillipians 4:19).

What are our spiritual needs?  Spiritual needs are God-given deep desires rooted in core longings that only God can meet. Core longings of the soul are love, safety, understanding, purpose, significance, and belonging. All of our needs: spiritual (love), mental (purpose), emotional (understanding), physical (safety), social (belonging), and financial (significance) are all established in our core longings.Our longings trigger us to go to God. Out of His love for us, God designed us to long for Him to meet our needs that only He can fulfill.God has given His promise and His oath of provision. This hope is a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls.

PONDER and WANDER: When we come to God to meet our spiritual need first, we are able to enjoy His blessings and provisions of love, safety, understanding, purpose, significance, and belonging. Providing for our needs is not something that God does, it is WHO HE IS: Jehovah Jireh, the trusted God who provides. We have to take time to discover the impact of core longings and our responses to them so that we can train our hearts and souls to ask God to meet them.

If you choose, Ponder these questions with Jesus and ask the Holy Spirit to help you notice the responses. Then, you can surrender these areas to Jesus and CHOOSE to need God!

• Soul care training exercise: We will spend our energy trying to meet the need of what we most desire. Ask the Holy Spirit to show you the longing you spend most of your time trying to meet. Is it safety, understanding, purpose, significance, belonging, or love?
• Once you figure out what you desire, think about what you do to meet that need. As it comes to your mind notice is the need ever truly met?
• Now, decide where you need to acknowledge and choose to need God.

Please know that soul training is not a one time experiential. If we want to choose to need God in every area of our life, we will have to continue to notice when the priority of our needs have shifted away from FIRST addressing our spiritual need for God. Making our spiritual needs a priority sets the direction of our heart to recognize what we need most is the love of God, it develops the habit of seeking God first, and trusting Him to meet every need and core longing.

PRAYER: God I choose to desperately need you every day in every way! I repent for acting as though it is me who meets my needs.When the core longings within me are activated, help me to come to you first and to resist the temptation to depend on what I think I can do or what I think I know. A songwriter once said, “like the desert needs the rain, I need you. Like the morning needs the sun, I need you. Like the ocean needs the rain, I need you. Every day in every way, LORD I need you.” I agree with these words. I am desperate for you because I choose to be.  In the strong name of Jesus I pray, Amen. 

PRAISE: Now that you have emptied your mind of the clutter and wandered with Jesus, take a closing moment to thank God for providing your every need!  Let the work of your wandering fill you with the assurance that our God will supply your every need according to His riches in glory.

Then take the mindfulness of God’s presence cultivated in these last few minutes of wandering into the next ones and beyond.

Until next time, be Resonant.

PERSONAL BONUS: If you choose, take another five minutes to read about the teachable moment where God showed me what it looks like to choose to come to God to meet every need.

While serving at the Northwest Haiti Christian Mission (NWHCM) I participated in Meals on Heals ( similar to our Meals on Wheels Program). Several times a week families most at risk for starvation receive a few bowls of rice and beans to decrease their hunger. As the team serving walked within the community and distributed bowls of rice and beans out of an empty paint bucket, my perspective of prioritizing my needs changed. While the cement homes were filled with 10-15 people and they needed the donated rice and beans to meet their physical need to escape starvation, it was not their priority. Several of the families had joy. They greeted us with smiles of thanksgiving, shared their testimonies of answered prayer, and invited us to pray with them. In an impoverished country where several natural disasters destroyed the little they had, villagers longed for God’s presence and love.  They chose to need God not out of desperation but out of living Proverbs 3:5 and relying totally on God to meet ALL their needs.  Notice the ten children sitting outside of this one room cement house. Notice the bare feet in the picture. These same feet walk to worship service to praise God for sufficiently and abundantly meeting all of their needs. During my time in Haiti, I received much more than I gave. I found hope. I experienced true teachable lessons of what it looks like to make seeking God first a priority and trusting Him to meet ALL needs. I am hopeful that I too can practice this type of dependence. In the United States, God abundantly meets even our basic needs. I appreciate the provisions of food assistance and food banks, homeless shelters, public housing, and so many resources that God has provided for the United States. Even in desperation, He is meeting all our needs. I experienced true teachable lessons of what a chosen need  looks like. 

The post Chosen Need appeared first on Resonant 7.

Image attributions:
All my needs: Belovedwomen.org with added text
Choose to trust God to meet your needs: Pixabay with added text
Every day in every way: Belovedwomen.org with added text
I need you like the sun: Pixabay with added text