Thursday, January 23, 2014

Made to Crave, Week 1, Psalm 84:2

This post is a part of the Made to Crave online bible study from Proverbs 31 ministries.


For this blog entry, I chose option #2 which is to "Unpack our scripture for the week and share with us what you learned"

MY SOUL YEARNS, EVEN FAINTS FOR THE COURTS OF THE LORD; MY HEART AND FLESH CRY OUT FOR THE LIVING GOD. -  Psalm 84:2 (NIV)

MY SOUL = Very being, essence
YEARNS –desires, pines after
FAINTS – becomes weak
MY HEART – inner man, mind, will, heart
AND FLESH - flesh
CRY OUT – shout, sing for joy
FOR THE LIVING – alive
GOD – almighty

Psalm 84:2 - Amplified Bible (AMP)
2 My soul yearns, yes, even pines and is homesick for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh cry out and sing for joy to the living God.

Does my soul yearn, even faint for the courts of the Lord?
Do my heart & my flesh cry out for the Living God?
Or does my soul, my very essence, crave or even desire other things before God?

These are the questions that come to mind when I begin to unwrap this verse. If I am being completely honest, I wish I could say that I do put God above everything else or that I “crave God” more than anything, but I don’t.

It becomes very apparent to me especially when my flesh would rather sleep in that extra 30 minutes in the morning than get up & spend time praying or reading my Bible before leaving for work. Or when I come home in the evening & plop down on the couch to watch TV to relax instead of being more intentional about reading one of the many books that I’ve bought & haven’t read yet. One that will enrich my spiritual life & help me to grow as a Christian.

Yes, my soul & my heart desire to spend more time with God & to be in his presence. Especially since I know that on those occasions when I am intentional about spending that time with God, there is fullness of joy in His presence. I always come away feeling refreshed, renewed & restored. But my crazy flesh wants to get in the way.

For me, this "made to crave" journey is going to be more about craving God & His presence in my life than it will be about food. I've done this study several times before & in the past it had been about food & weight loss. But the more times I've gone through this study, I've realized that it's more about putting things or craving things more than I do Him. Through the past times I've been through this study, I have lost weight, controlled my food cravings & quit smoking. But this time, I'm going to focus more on what is keeping me from spending more time with Him.


2 comments:

  1. I loved your post, Tiffany! While I do struggle with food issues, I also struggle with craving other things over God. I know that in week one, He's already working on me to change that in a big way. It sounds like He's working on you as well and I think that is WONDERFUL. I'm praying that you will maintain your focus on Him during this study and continue craving Him when the study ends. Love you, sister!

    Blessings and love,
    Christina (Proverbs 31 OBS Small Group Leader)

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