What Does God Want From Us?

Have you ever asked yourself just what it is that God wants from you above all else?  What the real purpose of life is? Most of us, at one time or another, have at least considered questions such as these in the midst of life's ups and downs. I know I have. Growing up, I attended church regularly but never really knew God in a personal way. If you had asked me if I believed in Him, I would have said yes, although my belief was little more than mere head knowledge about a very distant, demanding God who was always ready to punish. Not surprisingly, my "faith" was weak and superficial. If you had asked me then what God wanted from me above all else or what the purpose of life was, I probably would have said something like "to be a good person, to behave, or to simply obey the rules...that the point of our existence was to just not live wrongly or make God mad." And of course, this is a misinformed perspective about what God most wants from us.

Along those same lines, there are various other perspectives on this issue. Author John Eldredge says that within Christian circles "from some denominations we're told that what God wants is obedience, or sacrifice, or adherence to the right doctrines, or morality. The more therapeutic churches suggest that no, God is after our contentment, or happiness, or self-actualization, or something else along those lines. God is concerned about all these things, of course, but they are not His primary concern."

So, what is God's primary concern? Fortunately, we can go straight to the source Himself to find out. Looking at Scripture, we find that Jesus was actually confronted with this very question by the Pharisees and experts in the law who were testing Him as they asked, "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?" Jesus replied: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment" (Matt. 22:37-38).

There it is. Above all else, God is concerned that we love Him. Nothing is more important to Him than that. He is more concerned that you love Him than He is with anything else, even more so than your service, good deeds, sacrifice or giving. Yes, loving Him is the primary purpose of life, what He wants most from us. You see, God knows that when we love Him first, the other things He desires for us will follow. Out of our love for Him we will naturally serve, give, obey and love others sacrificially. And when we do, it will be a joy and not a burden. The more we love Him with our heart, soul and mind, the more His love will simply flow out of us for the world around to experience. But we have to start with Him...receiving His love and loving Him in response.

Let me take this a step further to emphasize the essence of what God desires. God is not satisfied with our good "Christian duties" if we don't truly love Him. In the book of Isaiah God speaks a powerful message to His half-hearted people as He says, "These people come near to me with their mouth and honor Me with their lips, but their hearts are far from Me. Their worship of Me is made up only of rules made by men" (29:13). Put simply, God is not pleased with people going through the motions of "Christianity," doing their good deeds and services if their hearts are not completely His...if they don't truly love Him.

A respected pastor once told me, "God is not as concerned with activities as He is with relationships." And the relationship He is most concerned with is the one between you and Him. In reality, He is more concerned that you love Him than He is that you run around doing a bunch of activities and things for Him. This is not to diminish the good works God uses us for in this life. Of course, when we love Him good works should be a natural result. But they are not the point. Loving Him is the point. I'm completely convinced that everything in life should flow out of your relationship with God, your love for Him. When that is first in your life, your other priorities fall into place. You are able to serve, give, sacrifice, love others and so on, out of your love for Him. You will want to do these things. If you don't really love Him you end up doing them out of a sense of duty and obligation, and this is not pure. This becomes grueling and exhausting, leaving you burned out and frustrated.

Later in Scripture Jesus actually goes as far to say that all of the other commands hinge on this first one to love God (and others). And this is why He commands that we love Him first. He knows this must be the foundation, the starting point for all we do. Even our ability and motivation for obeying the other commands will only be true when we love Him first. If not, we will bear little fruit that lasts, in spite of how much "good" we attempt to do. As Jesus said, “Remain in Me as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in Me" (John 15:4).

Let this message not be a burden causing you to try harder to please God. But rather, let a sense of freedom come as you realize that God just wants you. He just wants your love. Certainly the other commands are important and good works are desired, but they will fall into place naturally with joy as you love Him first. So today, I encourage you to simply take a break for a moment, even from your good deeds, and simply love God. Nothing else you do today will matter more than this. And truly, all else you do hinges on this.

So can we actually love God with all of our heart, soul and mind if we don't really know Him in a personal way? We will discuss this aspect of loving God in the next post...