Changing Desires

Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. ~ James 4:9

This scripture doesn’t sound Biblical…I’m sure it can’t possibly be in there.  Why would the Bible say this?  Because this verse isn’t speaking of healthy, biblical things.  James 4 is talking about what our flesh, our lusts, and our culture have told us we need to desire…not what our heavenly Father desires for us.  So when the Bible says to grieve, mourn, and wail, it’s talking about separating ourselves from the attitudes, desires, and “needs,” we had when we were more connected to the world than we were to our heavenly Father.  I’ll say that again, we are to separate ourselves from being more connected with the world than with God.  God wants us to shift our needs and desires from what our culture says we need and desire to what Father God says we need and what He desires for our lives.

Here’s a brief illustration of marriage.  The Bible is clear that the husband is to be the head of the household, even the head of the wife and he is to love her as Christ loved the church, (Ephesians 5:21-33).  Our culture has taught us that if our husbands don’t lead the way we feel they should, then it is up to the bold, vocal, and strong-willed women to lead the home “the way God would want it.”  Somewhere along the way, women were fed the lie that it is “biblically sound” to push our “weaker” husbands aside and take charge of the home and that by doing so, we are doing what is best for our marriages and our children.  But how is that living out anything in Ephesians 5?  Don’t misunderstand or misalign this message; God does not want abused families to continue to be abused.  God desires healthy marriages and healthy families.

So how do we make the shift from being more connected with our culture’s desires to God’s?  “Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you,” (James 4:7).  Our society has taught us that “submit” is a very ugly word, but it means to “voluntarily arrange ourselves under the command of a leader, to arrange under authority, to yield to one’s admonition [counsel, advice, caution],” (submission,blueletterbible.org; admonition,dictionary.com).  We are to go to God, ask Him what He desires for our lives, and then arrange our lives as such.  And if we do not understand what He is saying to us (if we don’t understand what it looks like or how to Biblically submit to our husbands), then we are told to ask God for wisdom, and He promises to give us an abundance of wisdom, (James 1:5).  God doesn’t want us to live a lie or live in misunderstanding.  God wants His kids to have victory!

Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. James 4:10