Heart's desire

I desire the Lord above all things. To abide in His presence is my ultimate goal. To glory in His light and praise His holy name for all the vastness of eternity is my only aspiration. He is the fullness of everything. To chase after anything else is to labor after emptiness and void. What a fruitless, wasted life! I want my heart to be so bound up with Christ that someone would HAVE to know HIM in order to know me.

In Jesus Christ I have known love and care like I've never experienced nor can I experience in this life. No human attempt can compare. No mortal love will satisfy my heart, which was created for the adoration of a Holy God. For this I was made, and this is my sole pursuit.
God the Father created me in love. Jesus Christ sacrificed himself to save me, in love. The Holy Spirit abides within me, guiding and protecting, revealing and helping, in love! Only such a love is pure. Even my own heart, a love sacrifice for my redeemer, is blemished and tarnished, lacking and completely unworthy. God has loved me with a perfect love. He sent His son to live a perfect life, die a death deserved by me,to bear the full wrath of the Father to set me free! Then conquered death and rose again on the third day. Returned to heaven to reign and rule forever, leaving us with a perfect helper in His own spirit to live inside me. This is how my God has loved me.

My God has loved me in patiently and tenderly calling me back from death over and over again. Each time revealing more of himself to me and withstanding with all understanding my rejection of His perfect love. Until one day, He got through to my stubborn heart the thing he wanted to show me all along. That I have never walked alone, and I never have to walk alone. God's presence is constant in all things, at all times. I need only seek Him and I will find Him. In His mercy, God did not remove from me the tormenting darkness until I realized that I did not need Him to remove it so much as I needed him to walk with me through it. Once I understood this, what freedom! I could have courage in the face of anything. I could not be conquered by darkness in the presence of the Lord, and I was always in the presence of the Lord! This alone would have been enough. I could have endured for all the rest of my days dwelling in darkness knowing that the Lord has never left me or forsaken me, that he stood with me inside it. God showed me his presence in the darkness, and then in a display of power like I've never seen, He reached down with His mighty right hand and removed the darkness and set it apart from me. Then he filled that empty space with such peace and joy as I've never known.

Praise the Lord for His goodness and mercy. He has dealt with me with kindness and all gentleness. He is a loving, attentive Father who desires good things for his children. Praise God with all my heart, with all my life. Praise Him to the end of this life and throughout the next.

Lord please keep these truths central in my mind. May I remember your lessons always. Stay with me in way that I will never forget the things you have shown me. Please keep walking with me. Reveal to me the deep truths of your love. Praise be to your name for all eternity. You alone are worthy to be praised.