Before you answer me, I want you to do something.
Put down the answer you have learned to give.
Put down the answer that sounds good in church.
Put down the answer that makes you appear faithful.
Put down the answer you think a Christian woman ought to give.
And for just a moment, tell yourself the truth.
Do you want God, or do you want what God can give you?
I have had to sit with that question.
Not once.
More than once.
And truthfully, I am still sitting with it.
Because I love God. I do. I love Him with the kind of love that makes me want to know Him, walk with Him, hear Him, and live a life that brings Him honour.
But I have also discovered something about the human heart.
It can love God and still become fascinated with His gifts.
It can worship Him and still keep one eye on the blessing.
It can say, “Lord, Your will be done,” while quietly hoping that His will looks remarkably similar to our own.
That is where the question became personal for me.
Because I began to notice that some of my prayers were not really prayers of surrender.
They were beautifully worded requests for the life I had already decided I wanted.
“Lord, open this door.”
“Lord, make a way.”
“Lord, provide.”
“Lord, bring the right person.”
“Lord, bless this work.”
“Lord, let this happen.”
And there is nothing wrong with asking God for these things.
We are His children. Jesus taught us to ask. Scripture tells us to bring our requests before God. There is no virtue in pretending we have no desires.
But somewhere between the asking and the waiting, God began to show me something in my own heart.
I was not only asking Him to bless my life.
I was beginning to attach my peace to whether He did.
And those two things may sound alike, but they are not.
There is a difference between saying, “Lord, I desire this,” and saying, “Lord, I need this to happen in order to be okay.”
One is desire.
The other is dependence.
And sometimes the thing we call faith is simply our determination to believe God will eventually give us what we have already decided we need.
I had to confront that in myself.
Because if I say, “God, I trust You,” but what I really mean is, “God, I trust You to give me the answer I am hoping for,” then perhaps I am not surrendering at all.
Perhaps I am negotiating.
And who am I to negotiate with the Author and Finisher of my faith?
The Things We Quietly Place Before God
Perhaps you know what I mean.
You love God.
You pray.
You worship.
You read Scripture.
You serve.
You believe.
And yet, there is a little list.
Maybe you do not write it down.
God already knows it.
The husband you are hoping for.
The child you are waiting for.
The business you want to flourish.
The promotion you believe is overdue.
The money you need.
The opportunity you have been praying about.
The ministry you believe God has called you to.
The recognition you hope will finally come.
The door that, in your mind, would change everything.
You carry these things to God because you believe He cares.
And He does.
But I am learning that even a good desire can become dangerous when I begin to believe I cannot have peace without it.
That is where desire crosses a line.
Not when you want something.
But when something you want begins to tell you whether God is good.
That is a dangerous place for the heart.
So God has been teaching me to ask myself better questions.
Can I desire the blessing without demanding it?
Can I pray boldly without becoming entitled to the answer?
Can I hope for something without making it the condition of my joy?
Can I say, “Lord, this matters deeply to me,” and still have the courage to say,
“But if You choose differently, You are still good.”
That is not an easy prayer.
But I believe it is an honest one.
And perhaps that is what surrender really begins to look like.
Not wanting nothing.
But refusing to let what you want become your master.
The Question I Could Not Escape
There came a point when I had to ask myself something that made me uncomfortable:
If God gave me none of the things I am asking Him for, would I still want Him?
I want you to sit with that.
Do not answer too quickly.
Because it is easy to say God is enough when the prayer has been answered.
It is easy to sing about His faithfulness when the door has opened.
But what happens when the door stays closed?
What happens when the answer is delayed?
When someone else gets the opportunity you prayed for?
When the relationship you hoped for does not happen?
When the money does not come when you thought it would?
When the dream takes longer than you expected?
When your carefully drawn timeline begins to fall apart?
When God whispers, “Not yet.”
Or when, in His wisdom, He says “No.”
What then?
Would you still want Him?
I want my answer to be yes.
Not because I have stopped dreaming.
Not because I have stopped asking.
Not because the things I desire suddenly mean nothing to me.
But because I am learning that there is something more precious than receiving everything I ask for.
It is knowing the One I am asking.
Paul understood something about this.
In Philippians 3:8, he speaks of counting everything else as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ.
Knowing Christ.
Not merely knowing what Christ can do.
Not merely knowing what He can provide.
Knowing Him.
There is a world of difference between the two.
And I am beginning to understand that difference in my own life.
I Still Ask
Let me make something clear.
I have not stopped asking God for things.
I still dream.
I still have desires that sit deeply in my heart.
I still ask God for provision.
For favour.
For wisdom.
For opportunity.
For relationships.
For open doors.
For purpose.
For answered prayer.
I still believe God is a God who provides.
But I am learning to hold what I want differently.
With open hands.
Because there is a difference between saying,
“God, I need this.”
and saying,
“God, this is what I desire. I will ask You for it, but I will not worship it.”
That is surrender.
And surrender does not mean becoming a woman who wants nothing.
It means becoming a woman whom her desires do not control.
What you want can be in your hands without becoming your god.
That is freedom.
Psalm 73:25 asks, “Whom have I in heaven but you?” The psalmist goes on to declare that there is nothing on earth he desires besides God.
Read that again.
This is not the voice of a woman who has no dreams.
It is the voice of a woman who has discovered something greater than her dreams.
God is not simply the One who provides her portion.
He is her portion.
And perhaps that is where many of us are being invited to grow.
To move from wanting God's hand to wanting His heart.
From being consumed by what He can provide to becoming captivated by who He is.
From holding tightly to the promise to becoming anchored in the Promiser.
From asking,
“What will You give me?”
to asking,
“Lord, who are You making me while I wait?”
Because perhaps the waiting is doing something in us that the receiving never could.
Perhaps the closed door is teaching us trust.
Perhaps the delay is teaching us patience.
Perhaps the season of obscurity is teaching us character.
Perhaps God is preparing us to carry the very thing we are asking Him to place in our hands.
And perhaps sometimes what feels like God's refusal is actually His protection.
We do not always know.
That is why it is called trust.
Do Not Lose the Giver While Reaching for the Gift
There is a particular danger that comes when God finally gives us what we have been praying for.
We can become so grateful for the blessing that we forget the One who gave it.
The answered prayer becomes the centre.
The open door becomes the identity.
The relationship becomes the source of security.
The success becomes the measure of worth.
The money becomes the evidence that God is with us.
And slowly, without intending to, we begin to worship the gift.
That is why I want more than answered prayers.
I want a heart that can receive an answered prayer without being possessed by it.
I want to be able to walk through an open door and still know who opened it.
I want to receive success without allowing success to tell me who I am.
I want to love people deeply without asking them to become what only God can be.
I want to receive provision without making provision my security.
I want to fulfil my purpose without allowing purpose to replace the One who gave it.
Because what God gives me should never become more precious than God Himself.
The gift should always point me back to the Giver.
So perhaps the question is not whether we should ask God for things.
We should.
Perhaps the deeper question is this:
What happens to my heart when God does not give me what I asked for?
Do I become bitter?
Do I withdraw?
Do I question His goodness?
Do I begin comparing my life with another woman's?
Do I assume that because her prayer was answered and mine was not, God loves her more?
Or can I remain rooted?
Can I say,
“Lord, I still desire it.”
“But I trust You more than I trust my desire.”
“I still hope for it.”
“But I refuse to make it the source of my peace.”
“I still believe You can do it.”
“But if You choose another way, I will not walk away from You.”
That is the kind of faith I want.
Not a faith that survives only when God says yes.
A faith that remains when He says wait.
A faith that does not collapse under disappointment.
A faith that can hold unanswered questions without losing its love for God.
Because at the end of it all, perhaps the greatest question is not:
“Did God give me what I wanted?”
Perhaps it is:
“Did I learn to want God more than I wanted what He could give me?”
That is the question I am carrying.
And perhaps you should carry it too.
Not as condemnation.
As an invitation.
An invitation to love God with open hands.
To dream without making your dreams your master.
To pray without making your prayers demands.
To desire without becoming desperate.
To wait without becoming bitter.
And to discover that there is a place in God where the heart can finally say:
“Lord, I would love to have it.
But I would rather have You.”
That is the posture I am learning.
And I pray it becomes ours.
A Prayer
Father,
Search me.
Not the version of me that knows how to sound faithful.
Not the version that knows the right Scripture to quote.
Not the version that knows how to say, “Your will be done.”
Search the hidden places.
The places where desire has become demand.
The places where disappointment has begun to speak louder than trust.
The places where I have quietly measured Your goodness by what You give me.
Teach me to want You—not simply Your hand.
Teach me to love You—not merely the life I believe You can give me.
Give me courage to bring my desires before You honestly, without making them idols.
Let me ask boldly, but surrender completely.
Let me dream greatly, but hold every dream loosely.
Let me receive Your blessings with gratitude without ever allowing them to take Your place.
When You say yes, keep me humble.
When You say wait, keep me patient.
When You say no, keep me trusting.
And when I do not understand what You are doing, remind me of who You are.
You are still God.
You are still good.
And You are still enough.
Teach me to live from that truth.
So that when You place gifts in my hands, I do not lose sight of Your face.
And when my hands are empty, I do not mistake emptiness for abandonment.
May I never lose the Giver while reaching for the gift.
I want You, Lord.
More than the blessing.
More than the answer.
More than the open door.
More than what You can do for me.
I want You.
Amen.