Nothing on Earth
This year, we're collaborating with writers across the Augustine Collective, a network of student-led Christian journals, to bring you a series of short devotional articles during this season of Lent, the 40-day period prior to Easter. Find this series also published by UChicago's CANA Journal and UC Berkeley's TAUG.
By micah hsu, uc berkeley
Do you ever preach to yourself the following lines?
“I need to put God first.”
“God should be prioritized above other things.”
“As long as I don’t love [fill in the blank] more than God, it’s not an idol.”
I do.
But what is the testimony of Holy Scripture?
“Whom have I in heaven but You?
And besides You, I desire nothing on earth.” [1]
Too often in our minds, an exclusive is replaced with a superlative—while Scripture expects that God is our only desire, we instead relegate God to being our primary desire, implying that there are secondary, even competing, desires. If Scripture requires us to have absolutely no other desires, then we have made a disastrous mistake.
You may well observe that Scripture also describes the holiest men as desiring many objects that are not God alone. The Apostle Paul says to the church in Rome, “I long to see you.” [2] The Apostle Peter commands us to “long for the pure milk of the word.” [3] In the Upper Room, our Lord Himself said to His disciples, “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you.” [4] Throughout Scripture, the holiest of men, even the Son of God, desired objects which were not God. Is this a contradiction in Scripture?
I believe the answer lies tucked away in one of the most monumental assertions that Christ ever made. When asked which was the greatest commandment in the Law, Christ replied, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and foremost commandment. And the second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” [5] The question that ought to bother us about Christ’s claim is this: if we have already loved our God with all our being—every emotion of our heart, every inclination of our soul, and every thought of our mind—how could anything remain with which we can love our neighbor?
Unsurprisingly, the answer lies in the text. The second commandment is indeed “like” the first: loving God is really the same as loving our neighbor. If we love God, we will love our neighbor, and if we do not love our neighbor, then we do not actually love God. [6] Love for our neighbor is a manifestation of love for God; the former flows from the latter.
Thus we find this principle: God ought to be our one and only love, yet we can still love others by loving them in Him and because of Him. Similarly, God ought to be our single desire, and nothing else, but we can still desire other objects inasmuch as they flow from our desire for Him. [7]
This principle applies to every way in which we relate to God and His created world. As a child, I would often scoop honey from the jar and eat it raw because I desired its sweetness, but it would have been better to desire its sweetness so that I could experientially understand just how sweet God’s wisdom is for my soul and give thanks to God for it. [8] Everyday, when I grow thirsty, I ought to be reminded that my need for hydration parallels my soul’s need for God’s presence. This is why the Psalmist frequently uses water and thirst as analogies for his desire for God. [9]
You see, each of our “worldly” desires is sanctified by stewarding it to our desire for God, through the word of God and prayer. [10] If it cannot be thus sanctified, Scripture expects us to have nothing to do with it. So the next time you really want something—new clothes, a concert, better friends—examine whether it flows from a desire for God. Make the case that more than being “not sin,” [11] it is positively spurring you to desire God more earnestly and enjoy Him more fully. And how could we not yearn to enjoy Him alone, Who loved us so much that He sent us His Son to pay the blood debt for our grievous sins? From Him and through Him and to Him ought to be all our desires, as the Psalter so wondrously proclaims:
“Delight yourself in Yahweh;
And He will give you the desires of your heart.”[12]
Micah Hsu is a third-year Mechanical Engineering student at UC Berkeley who loves the Psalms.
SOURCES
[1] Psalm 73:25 (LSB), emphasis added
[2] Romans 1:11 (LSB)
[3] 1 Peter 2:2 (LSB)
[4] Luke 22:15 (LSB)
[5] Matthew 22:37-39 (LSB)
[6] See 1 John 4:7-12
[7] For further consideration, Confessions IV.xii by Augustine. Excerpt: “If physical objects give you pleasure, praise God for them and return love to their Maker.”
[8] Proverbs 24:13-14
[9] Psalm 42:1, 63:1
[10] 1 Timothy 4:4-5
[11] Scripture requires us to lay aside sin as well as any weight that does not aid us (Hebrews 12:1). Weight is not sinful, but is a hindrance to us.
[12] Psalm 37:4 (LSB)