God asks me to find and receive everything in him!

Remember, this first paradigm states that God designed us to enjoy him fully! A third stifling misconception prevents us from enjoying him by thinking, God asks me to give up everything for him. When I was a teenager, I remember being afraid to surrender my life fully to Christ for fear that he would ask me to give up things that I wanted to have and experience in life.

The things I didn’t want to miss in life were for the most part good and worthy desires like getting married and having children. Why in the world would anyone think that God would withhold good things like these from us? And yet many of us falsely picture God as the great cosmic kill-joy! Actually, this false view of God should not surprise us since that was Satan’s lie to Adam and Eve in the Garden.

Some years later in life after I had gotten married and had kids, I found myself playing out this misconception as a father to my children. There were times when I denied them the simplest of pleasures for frivolous reasons. I was wielding my authority as “the dad”. When my children asked why, my response was, “because I said so.” But God is not like that!

There were other times when my heart was tender toward my children and I would buy them a treat or take them on some adventure that surprised and delighted them. When our youngest son was in grade school he and I spent many hours in the garage creating swords, knives, guns and light sabers for him and his buddies. I found tremendous joy in lavishing love on my kids like that and I’m sure you do too.

Look at what the Scriptures say about our heavenly Father, “If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!” (Matthew 7:11)

The liberating truth here is that God asks me to find and receive everything in him. King David and others expressed this so often in the Psalms. In Psalm 16:11 he worshiped God, “You have made known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand.”

In Psalm 23:1-3 (NLT), he declared, “The LORD is my shepherd; I have all that I need.” I love that— “Lord, with you as my shepherd; I have all that I need.”

©2009 Rob Fischer