When you don’t want to do what God wants you to do …

There will be times in your life when you do not want to do what you know God wants you to do.

At least, not the way He wants you to do it.

That desire isn’t sinful, it’s what you do with it that’s important.

At the center of the human experience is a desire to avoid pain and preserve self, even if it appears that doesn’t match with God’s will for you.

What do you do when you honestly, strongly, perhaps even passionately don’t want to do what God wants you to do the way He wants you to do it?

There is no better answer to that question than the example of how Jesus, Himself, handled that exact situation.

Jesus understood what His mission on Earth was, but when time came to fully execute the last part of it, the key part of it — the hardest part of it — He honestly didn’t want to do it as planned; He certainly wanted to see God’s plan of redemption for humanity fulfilled, but in a different way if at all possible. Jesus literally agonized over this:

“Then Jesus went with them to the olive grove called Gethsemane, and he said, ‘Sit here while I go over there to pray.’ He took Peter and Zebedee’s two sons, James and John, and he became anguished and distressed. He told them, ‘My soul is crushed with grief to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me,” Matthew 26:36-38.

Three times Jesus poured out His heart to the Father:

“He went on a little farther and bowed with his face to the ground, praying, ‘My Father! If it is possible, let this cup of suffering be taken away from me,'” Matthew 26:39a.

So great did Jesus agonize over His desire for a different way that an angel was dispatched from heaven to minister to Him, a fact only Luke provides us:

“He walked away, about a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed, ‘Father, if you are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from me … Then an angel from heaven appeared and strengthened him. He prayed more fervently, and he was in such agony of spirit that his sweat fell to the ground like great drops of blood,” Luke 22:41-42a, 43.

That’s some painful agony!

There’s no doubt about the fact Jesus desired some way other than the cross to fulfill His mission.

We see here the only moment in time when Jesus wanted something a different way than what God had planned. How He handled it is an an example countless Christians have turned to countless times over the last 2,000 years. Each time He shared His heart with God, He always added a greater passion, His ultimate desire:

“He went on a little farther and bowed with his face to the ground, praying, ‘My Father! If it is possible, let this cup of suffering be taken away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine,” Matthew 26:39.

“Then Jesus left them a second time and prayed, ‘My Father! If this cup cannot be taken away unless I drink it, your will be done,” Matthew 26:42.

“So he went to pray a third time, saying the same things again,” Matthew 26:44.

For the genuine, faithful follower of Christ who longs to be obedient to God and fulfill His mission, it is possible you might experience a time when you fervently, even passionately do not want to do what God wants you to do, at least the way He wants you to do it. How should you handle any such times? The exact same way Jesus did — by honestly pouring out your heart to God, but ALWAYS completely yielding any differing desires to what God’s will is for you.

“… Yet I want your will to be done, not mine.”

The example of Jesus for us is that our great desire, above all others, must be for God’s will to be done rather than our own. Our passions, our wants must always yield to those of God’s.

That’s how we handle any times in life when we may not want to do what God wants us to do, the way He wants us to do it. Put another way, change your desires to align with His, then carry out His will, to His glory.

You will never regret doing that.

A final note, which is a point of really good news for us, is that God is helping us with this matter so that we can be as obedient to Him as Jesus was: “For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him,” Philippians 2:13.

Scotty