To discover why
a person does, says, thinks, or feels certain things you simply need to ask.
“What do you want? What desires made you do that? What yearning led you to say
that? What did you fear when you felt so anxious?”
Then you need to
listen closely to their answers. People will often tell you exactly what they
want. “I got angry because she put me down, and I want respect. She became
speech-less because she yearns for acceptance. Those fantasies of heroism and
success play in my mind because I want to be successful.” If you know yourself
well, you will deduce the answer. Look for the pattern of their desires and you
will learn much about them.
Naming what you
want is easy. The hard part is learning to interpret what you have identified.
Naming the problem is not the same as understanding the problem. The desires of
the heart rest in the battleground of the soul.
Is it true that
we have these “needs” for respect, acceptance, money or significance that must
be met from outside ourselves? No one ever rightly understands and weighs
desires without God’s self-revelation in Scripture. God sees our hearts as a
war zone ruled by one passion or another. Either we chose to meet our desires
in the world or we chose to meet our desires through a relationship to God.
The apostles had
the confidence that only the gospel of grace and truth possesses sufficient
power to change us in ways we most need to be changed. The Good News that Jesus
Christ died for our sins and rose again is the starting point for a person’s
transformation. The mercies of God work to forgive and to change what is deeply
evil and sinful within us. He alone is able to cure our soul and set us on a
new path to life. All the other needs a client possesses can be addressed when
the heart has been transformed. It was true in Jesus’ day and is true today.
