Wishes and Desires

A couple of nights ago I could not sleep. I got up and came down to write. I started writing about my daughters. Abby turned thirteen this week. My youngest daughter is now a teenager. How extraordinary. A paragraph came, but the piece was not ready.

The words were jumbled in my mind. Random. Chaotic. Phrases--snatches of thought--unfinished. Articulation eluded me. My tongue mute. I could not traverse the path from my mind, to my fingers, to the screen.

Sometimes if I just simply write and give myself permission to freely associate then the words come.

Someone reminded me that God's ways are not ours, and of course, ours are not his.

My random associations made me think of Daughtry's song:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIUw4ZS1J_A

Every time I listen to this song it becomes a prayer. The truthful lyrics are far more about desires than about wishes.

This thought led me to think about Psalm 37:4.

Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.

Desires are not the same as wishes.

Wishes are evanescent and ethereal--beautiful bubbles that silently explode when they touch your hand. Desires are solid and substantial. Desires can be dangerous. They take root. They go deep.

My wishes fluctuate and vacillate. I am flippant with my wishes. I toss them around lightly—unconcerned where they land. Like the bubbles wishes are transient pleasures--momentary prisms. But my desires are established. Enduring prisms that have been intentionally cut. They are sharp and have edges. And I hold them very close.

Then the connection came: if I delight in Him, then the pattern of my thinking will slowly change. My thoughts will be brought closer to the reality of His. And then the wishes have a chance to mature and become his desires. And light will play on the planes of the prism.

Daughtry says be careful what you wish for...but God says, "You have not because you ask not."

Sometimes I forget to ask him anything at all. I just simply sit and play with bubbles.