How God's Plan and the Desire of My Heart Came Together

“Delight yourself in the LORD, and He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the LORD, Trust also in Him, and He will do it." - Psalm 37:5I've always loved the verse because I have to face it; I’m selfish. (Aren’t we all?) This verse implies that after we do what He says (Trust) we get what we want. "Okay God, you will give me the desires of my heart? I'm in!"The funniest thing about it is more recently, I have realized the paradox that God uses in this verse to bring us to Him. Essentially God knows how selfish we are as people. He knew in order to draw us to Him; we must first have some incentive. In my head, I can imagine God saying, “Hmm what can I give them in order from them to put all of their trust in me... Oh, I got it, the desires of their heart!”Six years ago, after attending a church service for the first time in a long time, I prayed a simple prayer like this after spending many years away from him. (I remember it like it was yesterday) “God, I trust you.” Essentially what I meant was, have your way in me and have your way in my life. That was the prayer, just that. I had been doing things my way for a long time, and in turn, I had created dysfunction in my life.

When I prayed that prayer, I was desperate for God's presence in my life.

I knew He knew the desires of my heart at the time. I didn't need to give Him a list saying; “God, please be the center of my marriage”, “restore my life”, “fix all the brokenness around me”, I just simply uttered out to Him the simple words "I trust you," and just like that instantaneously I was radically forgiven by my Father and He began to heal my heart.

I've learned God has a way of restoring us and breathing new life into dead circumstances.

Even in the bleakest of times, He can work things together for good. God didn't ask where I had been for all these years or what made me think I could do it on my own He just took me back, with open arms. Unknowingly the desire of my heart would become Him and His plan. When you are living out God's plan for your life, all the other details fall into place. Marriages/relationships will be completely restored, addictions will be broken and broken hearts will be made new.

Even in the bleakest of times, God can work things together for good.

The other day I was reminded of that verse when I heard it on the radio. At that moment, I was humbled to be reminded of my past. I just stopped and thanked God for knowing how to get my selfish, self-centered, stubborn heart to listen to Him. Formerly I trusted God because His word told me if I did He would give me what I wanted.I would be lying if I told you my desires before that prayer are my desires now, and that's where the amazing paradox comes into play. Once you trust Him wholeheartedly, His desires become yours. Now my heart yearns for the things of God, and my heart's desire is His kingdom and His kingdom alone. The greatest mistake of my life would have been to miss out on the desires of God’s heart because; quite simply they have given me purpose and fulfillment beyond my wildest dreams.

Six years ago I was a girl who sat in church, broken and lost.

My desires were the success of this world and as a result, had an unraveling life. One year ago, I sat on a mountaintop in a country in Central American with a group of 20 orphans. I was dreaming with my husband about starting a children’s home or even adopting these 20 children. Those ideas excite me more than anything ever has in my entire life. But, the most significant part was that these were the desires of God, not my own. I can tell you that life before my desires matched up with God's, wasn't life at all. Today I am so thankful He found me there that day to meet me and deal with my heart.

“For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.” - Matthew 16:25

I believe God is asking all of us, "Will you trust me?" He wants our hearts. He wants our lives. Not just a fraction of it, or parts that we aren’t afraid to give to Him but all of it. He wants our full submission (trust), and in turn, He will provide us with an amazing gift, the transformation of our hearts. Our hearts begin to be transformed into His desires for us. Personally, my heart has become His heart, and now I wouldn’t want to live life any other way. I pray that the same happens in your life.