People who pray regularly recognize and must accept that they don't always desire God as much as they wish they did. It is an uncomfortable truth that requires a certain amount of courage before we can even admit it to ourselves. But once we do -- once we accept that weare weak in our desires for God -- a new path opens up for us. We come to recognize that it is "better to be poor than a liar."
From such a place of honesty we are now free to choose whether agenuine desire for God is something that we really wish to have or not. If it isn't, then at least we are being true with ourselves and can now ask God to continue working in us so that this might someday become somethingwe actually desire. Perhaps this is the very "poverty of spirit" that Jesus spoke of as, paradoxically, a blessed state. If, however, a desire for God is something that we do wish for ourselves, then we simply and earnestly have to begin asking for it.
If, in examining ourselves, we recognize that our hearts have become tepid, it is quite legitimate for us to take a step back and pray for the desire to desire. If we feel that we have lost our passion, we can simply be honest about it and ask the Holy Spirit to increase our desire for God, to restore us to our first love, or to wean us away from the things that now distract us.
A sincere desire for God is something that can always be restored to us. But, before that can happen, it might be necessary for us to first recognize and admit to ourselves that it is absent.
O Jesus, my desires are often weak and wayward, and I don't know what I can do about it. I wish to see them increase and to have my life directed more towards what I know I desire most -- You.
Thank You Lord that this relationship does not wholly depend on me. For I know that I would be lost and without hope if it did.
Thank You that You continually create for me the path that I am to follow. There is nowhere else from which to begin this path than from where I am right now.
Thank You that, though You call me to seek You, You also reveal Yourself as the One who has already found me. In such faith, I know I am saved. Amen
Article by Rob Des Cotes
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