Psalm 42 starts off with, “As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God?” This psalm was written by the Sons of Korah and I love this opening passage. My initial thought was that you don’t meet many people who desire God in this way, but I don’t know if that’s true. We are all created by God and for God. The thirsts of our souls are meant to direct us back to our Creator. The real problem is that most of us attempt to satiate our desires for God through alternative means.

What do I mean by this? For example, we all want freedom and peace, but some people seek these sensations through alcohol. We all want intimacy and connection, but some seek it through pornography. Our souls are desperate for God, but most of us don’t realize it. That’s what sin is…it’s taking legitimate desires and fulfilling them through destructive means. We all want God like this psalm says…we just don’t all seek him.

One of my biggest desires is for love and friendship. I have a lot of that in my life right now, but sometimes these legitimate desires take me down the wrong roads. I start to get ambitious about popularity and success and let this pursuit get in the way of my relationship with God. The core desire is good, but I start to look in the wrong places to get those needs met.

The basic concept here is simple. You were created for God and by God. Your deepest needs are meant to be fulfilled by your Creator. The question is, how are you seeking to meet those needs? People pick all kinds of different things…food, drugs, sex, exercise, success, popularity, sports and tons of other things. Most of these things are not wrong in and of themselves…they just make lousy gods. John Piper said, “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him.” That pretty much says it. Does God satisfy you? Where do you look for satisfaction? How is it working?