Some of you may be reading this post thinking I’m referring to the devastating cyclones in Myanmar where over 100,000 people are declared dead. Or maybe you’re thinking of the earthquakes near Chengdu, China that have been devastating to the people there (including some of my friends).
While these things truly depict better than I could ever explain true desperation, I’m talking about the status of my heart and what God’s doing in me right now.
There’s a worship song I’ve led a thousand times that refrains “I’m desperate for you and I’m lost without you.” It’s been a constant reminder of the posture my heart should have before God. Our American culture relishes its self-reliance and comfort. We have insurance policies, plan “B”s, family that can bail us out when we’re in trouble. Truthfully, we’ve more likely than not never truly experienced any semblance of desperation.
Why is desperation a good thing? The easy answer as I’ve seen it in my life is because it keeps me dependant upon the Lord. Trusting God is a good thing – nay the best thing I could possibly spend my life/time doing. There are times in my life that I’ve truly reached the breaking point, the bottom of the barrell. The point where I’ve been so done, so finished, so wrecked that God is the only possible option.
In almost every case, I’ve been on the mission field.
I remember my first truly desperate moment being on the mission field in inner-city Brooklyn, New York. I remember the crash and burn, the complete exhaustion, the spiritual attack and loneliness I felt. And I remember how God took the next year to rebuild.
I remember pursuing the next experience after that not for the adventure but for the purpose of continually keeping myself in a position where I have to trust God.
A couple years after that my mantra in prayer as become “God, regardless of what I’m doing, keep me in a place where I have to trust you.” I designed silicon bracelets that have one word: “trust”. I wear it all the time.
But what comes after desperation? Do we live in a state of desperation? I don’t.
If God moves us truly to a place of desperation, a place where we truly experience relying upon Him for everything, we experience true faith and true peace for the very first time.
I’m finding myself not living in the anxiety of desperation, but in the faith and peace that God is able to be trusted with my life. It’s a place I choose to remain – especially when the “ease” of American life is so accessible. It’s what I choose instead of returning to my habits of luxury and self-reliance. I choose to remain there because trusting God is a good thing – the best thing. It’s the right place to be.
