What’s On Your Wish List?
by Roger Pook
We can probably recall the good advice we got when we were young: “It`s not good for you to eat between meals. It`s not good for you to leave all your homework until the last minute. It`s not good for you to go out dressed like that. It`s not good for you to hang around with that crowd”.
Looking back, we can probably see that it really was “not good for us”, but it didn’t seem like that at the time! Are we any wiser as adults? In some ways, yes. We have learned a little about life and how it works. But we often have a private ‘Wish List’ of things which seem to be really good, but which actually may not be God’s best for us. We want a career, a house, a good income, foreign travel, interest and excitement, a sense of personal well-being. None of these things are bad in themselves, but maybe God knows better those things that we actually need right now.
What is God’s response to our secret prayers, as we present our ‘Wish List’? We may have grown beyond the `prosperity gospel` and `naming and claiming`, but do we have the right to ask God for our `heart`s desire` if it might not be His best for us? God still wants us to ask, but only after we have first found our happiness just in Him. Then we can sincerely say, “Father, You know that this is what I’d like, but if it’s not good for me, then I don’t want it”.
Prayer: Dear Father, Your goodness and love towards me are beyond my understanding. You also know better than I do what`s good for me and what isn`t. So as I tell You now my heart`s desire, I`m also saying – if it`s not good for me, then I don`t want it. I`m so happy to trust in Your provision for my life. Amen.
Roger Pook For 21 years Roger Pook and his wife Christine served in Central and Eastern Europe, based in Hungary at the Úr Rétje centre of Ellel Ministries. From there they travelled and ministered across the length and breadth of the former communist world. In 2018 Roger retired as Regional Director and they now live back in the UK, where Roger still serves on the Executive Leadership and as a trustee of The Christian Trust. They still travel for the Kingdom!
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