Ever since
reading John Steinbeck's The Pearl in high
school, I've been haunted by a reflection of
Juana early in the novel. After her husband,
Kino, hauls a basket into their boat containing a
bloated oyster with a mammoth pearl, Juana senses
his excitement. Yet she pretends to look away.
"It is not good to want a thing too
much," she muses. "It sometimes drives
the luck away. You must want it just enough, and
you must be very tactful with God or the
gods."*
In the story that follows,
Juana's reflection becomes prophetic, as Kino's
burning desire to turn the giant pearl into
fortune destroys the simple but peaceful life
they had enjoyed. The story's moral is blatant
and chilling: it's dangerous to desire something
too much, and often self-defeating.
Beyond her superstition about
multiple gods, did Juana have a handle on a
principle of life that profoundly determines our
own success or failure? Does wanting a benefit of
life too greatly hinder our chance of obtaining
it? Does God work against us when our desires
grow too strong?
My study of Scripture has
actually done more to convince me of the importance
of desire than anything. Typically, far more is
taught in Christian circles about the dangers of
desire than about its benefits. Yet Scripture has
much to say about the positive--even
essential--role of desire in human life, both as
a motivator and as an indicator of God's
guidance. When Paul declares in Philippians 2:13
that God works in us, the Greek verb
literally translates "energizing." Paul
is saying that God is stimulating us to do
certain things with our life, through giving us
certain desires that reflect his will.
Over a lifetime, most of us
discover that we are most productive, and best
relate to others for Christ, when we're doing
work that we fundamentally enjoy.
Granted, certain desires are
dangerous to us, even in small doses. The urge to
experience a drug-induced high, or to pursue an
affair with a married individual, will only lead
to heartache if we give in to it.
But what about the desire for
otherwise wholesome benefits of life? Can the
longing to develop a certain talent, to succeed
in a particular career, to provide for my family,
to be married or to marry a certain person, grow
so strong that it contributes more to my failing
than succeeding?
Self-Defeating Reactions
Let's set aside for a moment the
question of whether God himself works against us
in such cases, and look first at the human side.
There is little question that we often shoot
ourselves in the foot when desire grows too
strong. One common reason is that because we are
so eager to gain a certain benefit, we may be too
willing to make compromises or sacrifices which
aren't truly necessary to our success. We may be
too ready to sell ourselves short.
When
desire is exorbitant, we are also more prone to
nervous or impulsive reactions that hurt our
chances of succeeding. Our neediness works
against us. When Kino realized he had found an
extraordinary pearl, "he put back his head
and howled. His eyes rolled up and he screamed
and his body was rigid."* His exclamation caught
the attention of other divers in the area, who
quickly rowed to his canoe. News of his discovery
soon spread like burning underbrush; pearl buyers
schemed to defraud him, and robbers plotted to
steal his prize. If Kino had merely kept his
discovery to himself for a while, he would have
avoided endless problems, and might have had time
to come up with a reasonable strategy for selling
the pearl. One impulsive reaction forever
destroyed his bargaining edge.
In his You Can Negotiate Anything,
master negotiator Herb Cohen observes that in
situations in life which require negotiation, we
are usually at a disadvantage if we desire a
result too greatly. It is important to
care about the outcome, Cohen insists, but
"not to care too much." When our heart
is too fully in a matter, we often do better to
let someone else handle the negotiating for us.*
Where Jacob Failed
We find an enlightening biblical
example of Cohen's cardinal principle in the
odyssey Jacob went through to win Rachel's hand
in marriage (Gen 29:18-30). Jacob agreed to serve
Rachel's father, Laban, as a field laborer for
seven years, in return for permission to marry
Rachel afterward. Yet once Jacob had completed
this period of service, Laban changed the terms.
He gave Jacob his other daughter, Leah, to be his
wife, then offered to give him Rachel also if he
would serve Laban for a another seven years.
What's stunning is that Jacob
agreed to all of these terms, and as far as we
know, never tried to challenge any of them. We
might assume that such arrangements were simply
traditional at that time. Yet when Abraham's
servant had come to Laban's family previously, to
seek a wife for Jacob's father, Isaac, Laban and
his father agreed to let Laban's sister, Rebecca,
return with the servant to marry Isaac the
following day (Gen 24:50-51, 55-60).
Abraham's servant secured a wife for Isaac from
Laban's family without having to provide any
labor in return. Nor was any service required
from Isaac, Abraham or anyone for the prize of
Rebecca.
Laban's family agreed so readily
to let Rebecca go because they strongly desired
for family members to marry within their extended
blood family, and options were few and far
between. This incentive was so high, in fact,
that Jacob almost certainly could have negotiated
much better terms for his own marriage to Rachel
if he had tried.
Yet Jacob served Laban for
fourteen years for Rachel, while no one served a
single day for Rebecca. Why such an outlandish
difference in terms?
The reason is that Abraham's
servant-to use Herb Cohen's expression--cared,
but did not care too much. He clearly wanted to
succeed and please his master, yet neither his
happiness nor his standing with Abraham depended
upon his succeeding (Gen 24:7-8). Jacob, on the
other hand, was crazed with desire for Rachel. He
simply was not in a good state of mind to
negotiate fairly for himself, and far too ready
to accept the first arrangement offered to him.
Jacob's fatal flaw was that he did
care too much. His love for Rachel was nothing
short of an obsession. After she died, he
developed a similar fixation on her first-born
son, Joseph. Yet his exorbitant love for these
two individuals set him up for extraordinary
heartbreak when these relationships dropped out
of his life.
From all the evidence we have,
Jacob was not a truly happy person, particularly
in his later years. Rachel's death, and Joseph's
disappearance, left him chronically
grief-stricken. Years later, when he was reunited
with Joseph in Egypt, Jacob confessed to the
Pharaoh that he had been depressed for much of
his life (Gen 47:9).
Expecting the Best from God
Appreciating how Jacob's
fixations rendered his life miserable allows us
to address more meaningfully the question of
whether God works against our reaching a goal
when our own desire becomes excessive. God is,
emphatically, not against our succeeding. Nor is
he against our happiness. The God of Scripture is
not the capricious, prickly god of so much
mythology, who must be appeased and petitioned
tactfully if we are to gain what we want. God
loves us infinitely more than we love ourselves!
He desires the very best for us.
Which is just the point. Because
God loves us and wants the best for us, he may
refrain from granting a desire, if he knows that
doing so would actually diminish our joy over the
long term. Or he may wait beyond what we feel is
a reasonable period to grant it, to allow us the
opportunity to grow to the point that we are
better able to handle the benefits and
responsibilities that the dream entails.
God's concern is that, through it
all, we develop character and understanding which
helps us realize his best for our life. The good
news is that our desires play a critical role in
helping us recognize his will. Long-term
desires--especially those which have stood the
test of time--often give us a vital window into
what God wants us to do. God uses our desires to
motivate us to take important steps with our life
as well. Our most worthwhile accomplishments are
usually stimulated by significant desire.
Helping Our Desires to Work
for Us
Yet our desires, even for
legitimate benefits of life, can become
obsessive, as they did in Kino's case with the
pearl, and Jacob's with Rachel and Joseph. How
can we guard against this happening? How can we
harvest desires that provide us with healthy
motivation? And how can we make wise decisions
based upon the ones we do experience? Here are
some steps that can help.
 Broaden
your interests, diversify your affection. Jacob
wasn't wrong to love Rachel and Joseph, nor to
love them deeply. Where he went wrong was in not
diversifying his affection more. It appears that
for a long time Rachel wasn't merely an important
part of his life but his entire reason for
living. It doesn't seem that he had any
vocational interests which strongly motivated him
or other significant friendships. I have to
wonder if there was a treasure in Leah which
Jacob never discovered, because her physical
features weren't as appealing to him as Rachel's.
Most tragic was Jacob's fixation
on Joseph. Jacob had many other children and,
eventually, grandchildren. With the exception of
Benjamin, though, there is no evidence that he
ever developed the bond with any of them which he
enjoyed with Joseph. The results were tragic for
both Jacob and his children.
One of the best steps we can take
as a hedge against any one desire's becoming an
unhealthy obsession is to have a variety of
friendships and interests. As simple as the point
sounds, it is easy to get stuck in the inertia of
life and not broaden our contacts and interests
as fully as we can. Each friendship we have
enriches our life in unique ways, and most of us
do well to have a number of them.
It helps us, too, to understand
how resilient God has made us as humans. If one
friendship or relationship fails, we can find
another which provides as great support to us as
the one we have lost.
Each of us also has considerable
potential for experiencing joy through being
creative and productive. Here again, though, it's
important to have more than one area of talent
that we nurture.
I'll never forget an experience
in 1972, when I was visiting Sterling Sound in
New York City to master a Sons of Thunder record.
Following the session I was standing on the
sidewalk in front of the studio chatting with a
recording engineer who had helped us. A
disheveled beggar walked up to us. I was stunned
when the engineer embraced this man, greeted him
warmly, and asked him about his family. He then
stuffed a $20.00 bill in the beggar's shirt
pocket as he turned to walk away.
My engineer friend then explained
to me that this ragged man who had just
approached us was once one of the most respected
recording engineers in New York. Yet a fall had
damaged his hearing, to the extent that he was no
longer able to produce high-end recording.
Convinced he had no other meaningful options for
his life, he resorted to begging.
This was one of the most tragic
examples I've seen of someone staking his
identity too greatly on one talent.
At the other, and more positive
extreme, a friend recently told me how he had
helped an unemployed musician he knows obtain a
job as a technical writer. The musician initially
resisted the idea, complaining that he was only
qualified to perform music. He knew nothing about
the technical field my friend was encouraging him
to pursue as a journalist. Yet my friend insisted
that he could do it. He explained that you don't
have to be an expert in a field to write about
it, but merely able to express information
interestingly which others present to you. The
musician agreed to give it a try. He applied for
the position and the firm hired him. Now he is
doing well in the job, and supporting himself
comfortably.
Like the musician, we each have
areas of talent that are transferable--usually in
far more ways than we realize. As we open
ourselves to new possibilities, we are often
amazed at the doors God opens for us.
Deepen
your love for God. The single greatest
tragedy in Jacob's life was that he never
developed the close companionship with God which
his grandfather, Abraham, enjoyed. While Jacob
had some special encounters with God during his
lifetime, they were only very occasional. It
doesn't seem that he ever walked with God.
And what relationship he did have with him was
mainly opportunistic (Gen 28:20-22).
Had Jacob enjoyed a growing
friendship with God, he likely would have kept
his relationships with Rachel and Joseph in
better perspective. Not only would he have had
another, and greater, outlet for his affection,
but he would have had God's counsel and
encouragement to help him better order his life.
And undoubtedly he would have drawn on God's
strength more readily to move beyond his grief
over losing Rachel and Joseph.
I never tire of repeating the
cardinal advice of C. S. Lewis. Our problem,
Lewis, noted, isn't that we love things too much,
but that we don't love God enough. If our
attraction to some object of life is too strong,
we shouldn't try to reduce our affection for it,
but strive to increase our love for God.
Everything that we do to keep our
relationship with Christ strong and growing
contributes toward keeping our desires in healthy
focus. The most encouraging part is that, as we
open ourselves to Christ's influence, he works
within us to fashion our desires. While some
diminish, others grow stronger. The closer our
walk with him becomes, the greater can be our
confidence that our desires are reflecting his
intentions for our life, and motivating us in the
best possible way.
Be
patient. When a desire takes on too much
importance, usually part of the problem is that
we feel it must be met too urgently. The more we
can learn the art of patience, the better we'll
ensure that our dreams won't get out of hand.
The most important secret to
patience is learning that our experience of joy
can actually increase through delaying
gratification. We are happiest when we have
something to look forward to--even if it's a
dream on the distant horizon. Hope is central to
our happiness, as well as to our health and
vitality.
Here, ironically, Jacob has
something important to teach us. He did
understand the dynamics of patience well. It's
hard, in fact, to find a more inspiring example
of patience in Scripture than Jacob's. He waited seven
years for Rachel's hand, then agreed to work
another seven. Waiting to marry her not only
meant delaying sexual intimacy, but postponing
friendship on other levels as well. Yet Jacob
wasn't just willing to make this sacrifice of
time, but comfortable doing so. He was so
gifted at owning his desire as a future
hope, that the period of waiting "seemed
like only a few days to him because of his love
for her" (Gen 29:20).
Laban shouldn't have required
Jacob to labor so long for Rachel, and Jacob
certainly could have negotiated better terms. Yet
his patience in waiting for her is impressive in
itself. Where he went wrong was in fixating too
much on this future hope alone and in not seeking
additional outlets for his affection. If we can
combine patience with broadening our interests,
diversifying our affection and deepening our love
for God, this combination of steps will serve us
well. It will help us to stay encouraged, while
less tempted to devote more affection to any one
area of life than it deserves.
Be
open to options where your desire is moderate
rather than extreme. There is another
step that helps us considerably. One of the
best-kept secrets of happiness is that our
greatest joy is often found in choosing
alternatives where our attraction is moderate
rather than extreme.
Many find that they are happiest
in a marriage where their romantic attraction to
the other is significant but not volcanic. In
this case they're able to enjoy the benefits of
the marriage, yet still have a life apart from
it. And because their neediness is not as great
as it would be if attraction were overwhelming,
they're better able to give themself to their
spouse compassionately, and to sacrifice their
own interests for the sake of their partner's.
Best of all, their affection has
a chance to grow, since it's not already at full
throttle. Many discover that over the years their
attraction to their partner increases, and they
feel more "in love" after ten or twenty
years together than when they first married. When
romantic love is extreme at the start of a
marriage, one is often in for a letdown, as he
discovers that the other person cannot possibly
live up to his monumental expectations.
I realize that what I'm saying
flies in the face of the popular Christian idea
that you should "only marry someone whom you
can't possibly live without." Ironically,
most of us would find that if we did marry such a
person, we'd be miserable. Our well-being would
constantly rise and fall depending upon how well
we felt he or she was meeting our needs. And this
person, rather than merely being someone whom we
cherish as a gift of God, would become our God.
Many major life choices work best
when we base them upon moderate rather than
extreme attraction. I'm not suggesting we should
sell short important life dreams that we've long
held. Nor should we compromise them. Yet
sometimes we do need to renegotiate them.
This is necessary because our ideals so often
have sprung from a mix of healthy and unhealthy
influences.
In life's real time it often
works like this: God's best options for our life
seem good to us, but less than perfect. The most
encouraging part is that we don't always have to
wait for situations to perfectly match our ideals
before taking important steps of faith with our
life. Especially when trusted friends with good
judgment feel that an alternative is right for
us, we may do best to choose it, even though our
attraction to it is only moderate. Many find that
over time such a step of faith positions them to
enjoy blessings which greatly exceed their
initial expectations. Not a few find they have
stumbled upon a pearl of great price.
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