Controlling the Blaze

Becky and I have been going through Linda Dillow's Calm My Anxious Heart, which is about contentment in all aspects of life. This week we managed to get to the chapter dealing with greed and Dillow includes a really great quote from A.W. Tozer:

Within the human heart things have taken over. God's gifts now take the place of God, and the whole course of nature is upset by the monstrous substitution.

Dillow also refers to Proverbs 30:14-15a, but what caught my attention was 15b-16:

There are three things that will not be satisfied, four that will not say "Enough":Sheol, and the barren womb, earth that is never satisfied with water, and fire that never says "enough."

So verse 16 combined with Tozer's quote got me thinking...It is really easy for me to fall into the "fire that never says 'enough'" trap. I latch on to things and can't seem to get enough, particularly things of God: fellowship, word, and worship. Now a desire for these things is good, we should never be quenched, we should never be complacent when it comes to our walk with Christ...but I take it a little too far. I get fanatical (almost psychotic) about things.

Especially worship. God has given me a definite heart for worship and has allowed me the opportunity to use that by placing me in a worship band. But I've noticed that I may take things too far. I would love to worship 'til sunrise but sometimes I question my motives; whether I want to keep worshiping because we are giving God the glory due Him or because I love the feeling I get when worshiping and don't want it to end. When we close worship, I have to be careful not to sink into disappointment as I have done before. Instead of riding the afterglow and recognizing the value of the time just spent in worship, I begin to resent that it had to end.

I've done the same before with time in the Word. (I have a different theory as to why I crave fellowship so much, but that's another post.) I can easily fall into treating God as a drug, focusing on the high rather than on Him. And then I'm upset if/when the buzz isn't big enough.

All this, of course, makes me all the more thankful. I mean, any man (or woman for that matter) wouldn't take such abuse...