Does God desire to meet our needs or our wants?

2009 did not provide the much vaunted and much anticipated ‘Barbeque Summer’ in our neck of the woods. For much of the summer we did have the weather varied between wet and windy and very wet and very windy. Apart from a few good days in late June and early July, the Glasgow summer was even worse than usual and even our two dogs disliked venturing forth in it, as it rained and it rained and it rained. When it wasn’t pouring, it was pelting, although it would occasionally stop pelting to chuck down on us in a very passable impersonation of a Monsoon. Sometimes the rain fell straight down in a torrent; sometimes high winds propelled it on a more horizontal trajectory; either way, the summer of 2009 will be remembered for being…well, less than memorable. In fact, let me be blunt: it was rotten! And the problem with incessant rain is the incessant dampness. How do you get dry? The answer is, you towel down and change your clothes. But how do you get them dry, when continual rain makes using the washing line a non starter? As it is, we have no open fire but usually air our clothes on a drying frame in the kitchen, except that, while wet, the summer months were far too warm to turn on our gas central heating so we had to resort to the unseasonal solution of using our tumble drier. Or at least we did until the heating element failed.

About ten years old, our faithful old tumble drier had given sterling service over the years but now, with its heating element gone, it could no longer perform its proper function, leaving us stuck with having to dry our washing on the kitchen frame with the rain pouring down outside and the atmosphere saturated with humidity inside. It wasn’t great, but what to do? As Christians of many years standing, we have learned to walk in faith, and I have personally seen many sick people healed by the power of God. I’ve prayed for people with cancer and seen them miraculously healed. I’ve spoken over people who were dying and seen them spectacularly recover. On one occasion, the guy had actually arrested and had no respiration or pulse, but revived by the laying on of hands, so I felt pretty confident as I prayed over the old drier, laid hands on it and commanded it to work. In went the clothes, on went the dial and round went the drum. Unfortunately, the heater did not reciprocate and the washing would not dry, because blowing cold air through wet clothes is a pointless exercise. Undeterred though, I prayed and laid hands on it again over a few days, because some problems require perseverance. I blessed; I rebuked; I declared; I proclaimed, and then…nothing. Not a peep. ‘Hmm’, I thought. ‘How come I can heal cancer but can’t fix this flaming tumble drier?’ So, I forgot about it. Then a few days later my wife went out for a meal with a few of her work colleagues and when she returned home she said: 'We've got a new tumble drier'.

‘That’s great’, I replied,‘How did that happen?’

‘One of the girls from the work said she has one in her cupboard and we can have it. It’s almost brand new and still under warranty.’

‘Did you pray for a new drier’, I enquired.

‘No’, she said, ‘Did you?’

‘No’, I responded, and then explained how I had been praying and laying hands on the old machine for it to work. Then she explained how she had been sitting at lunch with her friends and not even been thinking about the tumble drier when out of nowhere, completely out of the blue and out of context she heard the words come out of her own mouth: ‘Our tumble drier isn’t working’. Immediately realising the inappropriateness of her comment, no sooner had the words come out of her mouth than she thought, ‘What on earth did I say that for?’ Then, suddenly, one of her friends remarked that she had a spare drier at home.

What had happened was that she had had a new fitted kitchen built which included it own integral drier, rendering her old one redundant. And, as I say, her ‘old’ machine was actually quite new, pristine in fact, and was now more of a nuisance cluttering up her hall cupboard. She had offered it to her sister who had said that she would like to have it, but after several weeks had made no attempt to uplift it. So, here was the perfect solution: my wife could have for nothing something we really needed while we would actually be doing the lady a favour by taking the thing away.

The next day we drove over and took our new tumble drier home: everyone was pleased with what was a win-win situation all round. We prayed and thanked God and were truly delighted, but I was also curious and asked God why he had given us a new machine we hadn’t asked for. He responded by reminding me of the scripture in Ephesians 3:20-21.

Now to him who is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, forever. Amen.

‘You had faith to repair your clapped out tumble drier,’ the Lord told me. ‘But I just wanted to abundantly exceed that and give you a new one’.

‘But I’d forgotten about it,’ I replied.

‘Precisely. And when your attention was no longer focussed on the drier but on me, I was able to reach out beyond your imagination.’

It was then that I realised how we so often limit God to what we are able to ask or think when he desires to do so much more. Then he asked me a question: ‘You know that old saying in the Church, “God will always give you what you need, but he won’t always give you what you want.” Do you believe that?’

‘Oh, no!’ I replied.

‘Well, you should’, said God, ‘because it’s true’.

I was puzzled. Wasn’t this a contradiction? Then the Holy Spirit showed me what he meant. You see, we too often limit God by the meagreness of our imagination, whereas, in the words of Paul in Philippians 4:19 -

But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.

We tend to major on the part about God supplying our needs, and overlook the point that his supply is not limited by our meagre resources but according to his riches in glory. God is neither stingy nor is he skint, and when we just let him get on with being God, he is freed from the limitations of our interference to do what he most desires which is to bless us. You see, most of us entertain a very finite image of God who is somewhat reluctant to give, when in fact he is neither. Our idea is that whatever we ask God for, he will meet our bare basic needs but will not stretch so far as any frills or extras we might want. When, in fact the very opposite true: When we pray, the limitations of our own imagination are actually a hindrance to God who is only too willing to exceed our wants and meet our true needs. It’s just a matter of perspective.

No, God doesn’t desire to give us what we want but to meet all our needs. It’s just that have for so long failed to understand that that means more than we ask not less. Hallelujah!