Recognizing Our Needs Series

Matthew 5:3: "God blesses those who realize their need for Him, for the Kingdom of Heaven is given to them."

Recognizing our need is the first key to a fruitful relationship with our Father. The very act of recognition elicits the need to recognize the heart. The Beatitudes demonstrate that the way to heavenly blessedness is opposed to the worldly path normally followed in pursuit of happiness. The world’s idea is that happiness is found in riches, merriment, abundance, leisure, and such other worldly things. The real truth is the opposite.

The Beatitudes give the character of true faith in Christ. This verse speaks of recognition of our need for Christ.

Psalm 51:17, "The sacrifice you want is a broken spirit. A broken and repentant heart, O God you will not despise." Recognizing the need for brokenness is the key to having a vital and fruitful relationship with God. Isaiah 1:12-20, "Why do you keep parading through My courts with your worthless sacrifices? The incense you bring Me is a stench in My nostrils! Your celebrations of the new moon and the Sabbath day, and your special days for fasting-- even your most pious meetings-- are all sinful and false. I want nothing more to do with them. I hate all your festivals and sacrifices. I cannot stand the sight of them! From now on, when you lift up your hands in prayer, I will refuse to look. Even though you offer many prayers, I will not listen. For your hands are covered with the blood of your innocent victims. Wash yourselves and be clean! Let Me no longer see your evil deeds. Give up your wicked ways. Learn to do good. Seek justice. Help the oppressed. Defend the orphan. Fight for the rights of widows." "Come now, let us argue this out," says the Lord. "No matter how deep the stain of your sins, I can remove it. I can make you as clean as freshly fallen snow. Even if you are stained as red as crimson, I can make you as white as wool. If you will only obey Me and let Me help you, then you will have plenty to eat. But if you keep turning away and refusing to listen, you will be destroyed by your enemies. I, the LORD, have spoken!" These verses give us an understanding of the Way of Life in which He wants us to live. This life isn’t found in parading around saying "Oh, look at me." No, it is found in giving up everything, and following Him who gave up everything for us.

This verse also speaks of all the times that we have only given lip service to the truth of God’s gift to us in Christ. Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith who loved me and gave Himself for me." This verse speaks of the complete surrender of the will to the Lord. As I have already said, in order to have a fruitful relationship with God, we must recognize our need for Christ. When we surrender our life to the Lord, a few things happen. The things that we once hold dear are no longer dear to us, because our emotions are crucified, they are no longer our own; no, they have been given over to Christ.

When we hold onto our emotions we are really saying, "No, God, you cannot enter that area of my life." When we do that we are all but saying no to the One who died for our sin, and saying "Yes, Satan, you can have authority over that area of my life."

It is when we allow though the Spirit of God to crucify and shed His light on our lives that we come to a true understanding of what our needs really are. Our need is to be crucified completely to Christ. After all, Christ became Man in part so that we could inherit the Kingdom of Light instead of the Kingdom of Darkness. If we don’t allow the Light to shine in our lives then we cannot say we have the Light in our lives. We really have the darkness that has captured so many, and even those who say they are really in the Light are really in the Darkness. When we recognize our needs, and as we come to an understanding deep within our wills that, yes, Jesus is the answer to the darkness of our souls. When this happens, we are then able to let the Light of Christ radiate in each area of our life. The result is a complete crucifixion of the flesh, and an embrace of the Way of Life that God has given us through the Blood of Jesus.