Is it right to get what I want?
I got a job. I know working women can be awesome mothers, but I still worried I made the wrong choice. A part of me wanted to spend my time completely with my daughter. But when I got this job opportunity handed to me on a platter, my heart leaped. I knew I wanted to work. Taking a year to focus on becoming a mother was the best decision I could have made, but now I was ready for something else.
The night after I got the offer, I knelt and spoke to God. I considered my options, my capacity, and my priorities. I spoke with my husband who said he would support me in anything. Smart man. I felt calm about it. I thought I could manage it. I had the impression that God wanted me to work again.
But there was a part of me that doubted. Was my desire to work tainting my ‘answer’ from God? Didn’t Christ say we should give ourselves entirely over to Him? To make His will our own? Shouldn’t I have to give up what I want for what is best? And what could be best other than my daughter?
Shouldn’t I have to give up what I want for what is best?
My confusion increased when I read ‘Atlas Shrugged’ by Ayn Rand, which made me reconsider one of my instinctive beliefs:
It is not right for me to get what I want.
Have you ever felt this way? Like a certain choice must be the right one because you have to give up what you really want to do?
After watching a rich young ruler walk away, Christ said, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.” This line has inspired many to give of themselves to come to know God. Catholics and Christians give up pleasures during Lent. Many practice fasting from food. Catholic Nuns give up their personal desires (and intimacy!). Monks believe that “spiritual perfection cannot be attained in everyday life” and they must seek for it in self-abasement (Monasticism). Even Plato believed in suppressing “bodily desires so that the soul can be free to search for knowledge.” (Asceticism)
The Ten Commandments tell us to deny many things. Paul told the Corinthians that he brought his body into subjection (1 Corinthians 9:25). Alma tells his son to “bridle all [his] passions.” (Alma 38:12).
C.S. Lewis said it more aggressively: “Give me all of you!!! I don’t want so much of your time, so much of your talents and money, and so much of your work. I want YOU!!! ALL OF YOU!! I have not come to torment or frustrate the natural man or woman, but to KILL IT! No half measures will do. I don’t want to only prune a branch here and a branch there; rather I want the whole tree out! Hand it over to me, the whole outfit, all of your desires, all of your wants and wishes and dreams. Turn them ALL over to me, give yourself to me and I will make of you a new self—in my image. Give me yourself and in exchange I will give you Myself. My will, shall become your will. My heart, shall become your heart” (Mere Christianity, CS Lewis).
Give me yourself and in exchange I will give you Myself. My will shall become your will. My heart, shall become your heart.
C.S. Lewis
I believed that giving up my personal desires was a good thing. Any time I made an important decision, I tried to be sure I wasn’t choosing something that I wanted, but what God wanted.And then I read the life-changing Atlas Shrugged. One of the main characters is a singular person named John Galt. He is the archetype of capitalism (or in Rand’s view, the archetype of what man can and should be). He is strong, sure of himself, and does not depend on anyone. He believes no one should receive things they did not earn and that no one should be deprived of things they did earn. Take a moment to take in that last sentence. No one should be deprived unnecessarily. In one of his most stunning (and lengthy) speeches John declares, “Self-sacrifice? But it is precisely the self that must not be sacrificed.” He mocks those who say, “Man’s good… is to give up his personal desires, to deny himself, surrender, man’s good is to negate the life he lives.” He says living that way, “invalidate[s] your own consciousness and surrender[s] yourself… lead[ing] you to misery, self-sacrifice, starvation, destruction.”
The book has many examples of people who deny themselves their pay, their desires, their pleasures, and their ambitions in the name of serving a higher cause. They give of themselves till there is nothing left but a shadow of who they once were. In fact so many people fall prey to this kind of thinking that the economy and the world collapse.
While I do not agree with everything that Ayn Rand purports in her novel, it did cause me to think. Is that the self denial that Christ is asking of us? I have seen people in my own life who denied themselves to a point of not knowing themselves anymore. Are we to reject our own desires, pleasures, and ambitions in the name of following our Savior? By accepting this job offer would I be denying myself and thereby allowing my will to be God’s? Or by refusing this job offer, would I negate the talents God has given me?
The key distinction can be found in a verse in the Book of Mormon where it says: “Yea, come unto Christ, and be perfected in him, and deny yourselves of all ungodliness.” Christ asks us to deny ourselves of ungodliness. Accept the good and deny the evil. Accept good ambitions, but deny pride. Accept confidence, but deny doubt. Accept the giving spirit, but do not give so much that we can’t live.
Yea, come unto Christ and be perfected in him and deny yourselves of all ungodliness.
Moroni 10:32
Sometimes God does ask people to sacrifice what they want. Abraham had to sacrifice his homeland, his family, and his son. Mary had to sacrifice good standing among her friends. Peter had to sacrifice his occupation. Christ told his disciples to leave their deceased family members and follow him. Job had to sacrifice everything. Sometimes He does ask people to give up jobs they like for something better. But just because we want something doesn’t necessarily mean God wants us to give it up. All desires are not evil.
I do not believe God wants to make us entirely new beings, but He wants to perfect the beings we already are. He is our Father and we have good desires built into our spiritual DNA. We are asked to sacrifice the ‘animal in us’1, but also asked to ‘deny not the gifts of God’ (Moroni 10:8). We are asked to be humble, but also asked to let our light shine before men (Matthew 5:16). We are asked to give ‘our time or means’2, but also asked to obtain our own means.3 We are asked to overcome weaknesses, shouldn’t we also cultivate our strengths, increase our talents?
I am not saying that those who have given everything are wrong. They do what they need to do and I respect that. I admire it. They dedicate their sacrifice to God. I heard someone say that ‘sacrifice without dedication is just going without.” If the sacrifice is dedicated to God, it is accepted by Him. But we are not asked to deny everything about ourselves. We can dedicate what we do, not just what we give up, to Him as well.
And when God does ask something of me, I am ‘all in’4. My Maker knows what sacrifices are necessary to help me reach the marvelous potential He has for me. He also knows what opportunities will build me up. I also will not diminish myself for no reason and call it a sacrifice. God never asks us to do that.
It is right for me to have what I want if it is good.
- “Thus, putting off the views and appetites of the natural man is such a large part of denying oneself, a process sometimes accompanied by scalding shame and the reflux of regret (see JST, Luke 14:28).
Yet sensory happiness is illusory happiness. Even legitimate pleasure is as transitory as the things which produce it, while joy is as lasting as the things which produce it!
Gross sins arise ominously and steadily out of the swamp of self-indulgence and self-pity. But the smaller sins breed there, too, like insects in the mud, including the coarsening of language. But why should we expect those who “mind the things of the flesh” to mind their tongues? (Rom. 8:5.)
So it is that real, personal sacrifice never was placing an animal on the altar. Instead, it is a willingness to put the animal in us upon the altar and letting it be consumed! Such is the “sacrifice unto the Lord … of a broken heart and a contrite spirit,” (D&C 59:8), a prerequisite to taking up the cross, while giving “away all [our] sins” in order to “know God” (Alma 22:18) for the denial of self precedes the full acceptance of Him.” ) Deny Yourselves of All Ungodliness, Neal A Maxwell
- “Sacrifice is a demonstration of pure love. The degree of our love for the Lord, for the gospel, and for our fellowman can be measured by what we are willing to sacrifice for them. Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ manifested the supreme example of this love. His life and ministry established a pattern for us to follow. His divine mission was culminated in a supreme act of love as He allowed His life to be sacrificed for us. Having power over life and death, He chose to submit himself to pain, ridicule, and suffering, and offered His life as a ransom for our sins. Because of His love, He suffered both body and spirit to a degree beyond our comprehension and took upon Himself our sins if we repent. Through His personal sacrifice, He provided a way for us to have our sins forgiven and, through Him, to find our way back into the presence of our Heavenly Father.
The sacrifice he requires of us is “a broken heart and a contrite spirit” (3 Ne. 9:20) that can lead us to repentance. When we consider His example, the demands made upon our time or means are slight in comparison. We should, therefore, give gladly and count it as a blessing and an opportunity.” The Blessings of Sacrifice, M. Russell Ballard
- “‘For,’ said he, ‘it is expedient that I, the Lord, should make every man accountable, as a steward over earthly blessings, which I have made and prepared for my creatures. …
‘For the earth is full, and there is enough and to spare; yea, I prepared all things, and have given unto the children of men to be agents unto themselves.’ (D&C 104:13, 17; italics added.)
Just as each individual is accountable for his choices and actions in spiritual matters, so also is he accountable in temporal matters. It is through our own efforts and decisions that we earn our way in this life. While the Lord will magnify us in both subtle and dramatic ways, he can only guide our footsteps when we move our feet. Ultimately, our own actions determine our blessings or lack of them. It is a direct consequence of both agency and accountability.” The Basic Principles of Church Welfare, Marion G. Romney
- “The scriptures speak of a rich young ruler who ran to Jesus, knelt at His feet, and, with genuine sincerity, asked the Master, ‘What shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?’ After reviewing a long list of commandments this fellow had faithfully kept, Jesus told the man to sell all his belongings, give the proceeds to the poor, take up his cross, and follow Him. The boldness of this directive caused the young ruler—in spite of his expensive sandals—to get cold feet, and he went away sorrowing because, the scripture says, ‘he had great possessions.’
Obviously, this is an important cautionary tale about the uses of wealth and the needs of the poor. But ultimately it is a story about wholehearted, unreserved devotion to divine responsibility. With or without riches, each of us is to come to Christ with the same uncompromised commitment to His gospel that was expected of this young man. In the vernacular of today’s youth, we are to declare ourselves ‘all in.’” (The Greatest Possesion, Jeffery R. Holland
