“Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.” (Psalm 37:4) Your deepest desires and God’s plan for your life are a perfect match for each other. You are meant to succeed in what you came here to do, and God is your biggest cheerleader. This is wonderfully good news. It means there is no need for compromise or “balancing” your desires with God’s desires for you. There is no need for an internal battle between what you want and what God wants. If you’re experiencing such an internal struggle, it just means that this truth hasn’t fully sunk in for you yet—which is more good news! Life can be and is meant to be more wonderful and fulfilling and exhilarating than you now know.

“[Y]our Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should perish.” (Matthew 18:14) That includes you and me right now, in this moment. Are you “perishing” under the mistaken belief that life must be a struggle? That God is against you, or that you are against yourself, or that life has wronged you? Then you are believing a lie. It is as simple as that. To one degree or another, we all believe such lies and need to repent, i.e. change our minds. It is a healing process in which our eyes are being opened, progressively transfiguring our world. Where we once saw disaster, we now see providence. Where we once felt pain, we now feel guidance. It’s not that we don’t experience tragedy or suffering or even that we understand it when it does happen. But we no longer fight it within ourselves, creating unnecessary suffering, and we no longer linger in blame or resentment. We are convinced that nothing can separate us from the love of God (Romans 8:35-39), and this becomes the bedrock foundation of our trust in Life.

“[T]hose who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. The mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace.” (Romans 8:5-6) The “mind set on the flesh” is the mind at enmity with itself and with God. It’s the false concept of yourself as separate and independent from the Source from which you came. To “live in accordance with the Spirit” is not to despise the body. On the contrary, it’s to heal the split, abandoning the false dichotomy of body and Spirit. It’s to recognize that “your bodies are a temple of the Holy Spirit” (1 Corinthians 6:19) and that “we are the temple of the living God.” (2 Corinthians 6:6) To have your mind “set on what the Spirit desires,” then, is to be in touch with your own deepest desires. It’s to see and trust that God is not at odds with you. Therefore, you need not be at odds with God. It’s to see and trust that your desires and dreams were planted by God and to be confident that “he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion.” (Philippians 1:6) It’s to know that the Spirit of Christ—the incarnation of God, the “word made flesh”—also lives in us and that that word “will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.” (Isaiah 55:11) It’s to know that you were made by God and God makes no mistakes.

Now here is your task. Give yourself permission to ask yourself: What are my highest hopes and my wildest dreams? What have I routinely dismissed or buried because it seems too good to be true? Then, with all your might, reject the lie that says you cannot have it. Believe unflinchingly that you are designed to have your heart’s desire. Trust that God, “who is able to do abundantly above all we can ask or imagine” (Ephesians 3:20) is for you and not against you. (Romans 8:31) Own the power of faith, which is the mountain-moving force of creation. (Mark 11:22-24) Delight yourself in the image of your dream come true, and you will receive the desires of your heart.