Is crucial to getting whatever it is we really need. But knowing is trickier than it looks. We’re not always clear about our actual needs. It’s a common human characteristic to confuse needs with wants. Essentials with desires. Fundamentals with extras.
The first move of grace is to open our eyes to help us see ourselves more clearly.
Grace helps me to spend time with good questions: What is it that I’m really lacking? Where is it that I’m truly empty? What is it that my soul deeply longs for? How am I trying to satisfy myself with things that don’t last? What will more fully satisfy my thirst?
Often we just don’t see our own selves clearly enough to match our needs with the myriad of options being advertised to us. It’s much easier to haphazardly jump from one activity to the next, one project to the next, one gadget to the next, one show to the next, one church to the next, or one relationship to the next. Fix to fix to fix, hoping that something will stick.
It’s damn hard to see the best thing, quietly waving its hand over in the corner, amid the throng of all the supposedly good things noisily clamoring for our attention.
The second move of grace is to open our eyes to see the gift that God is extending to us.
If we only knew, we would ask. So grace helps us to know.
