“It is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to Him must believe that God exists and that He rewards those who sincerely seek Him” (Hebrews 11:6).

We all know that Christians sometimes struggle with issues in their lives. Since we’re all humans, we also have the frailties that are associated with our humanity. One of the issues that many Christians (and non-Christians) battle is overindulging. You know that you’re overindulging in something when it places you in bondage to it. Millions of Christians are deeply in debt, because they’re seeking to fill a void in their lives with material objects.

Any place in your life that has overindulgence (or abuse) of something is really a void in disguise. The mistake that we tend to make when addressing the issue of overindulging is trying to medicate it with something or someone. This might seem strange, but the thing that you desire isn’t a desire at all; it’s the absence of faith. The more you learn to trust God, the less you will be driven by desires.

Anytime you want to know the root cause of something that you, as a believer, are wrestling with, just go to Genesis. Humans weren’t created in the image and likeness of God to be dominated and manipulated by our desires. In fact, if you will read about Adam before the fall, you will see that God anticipated and supplied all of Adam’s needs and desires even before Adam asked for them (Genesis 1-2).

The need to be desire-driven occurred when Eve believed the lie that the serpent told her about the character of God. The serpent began weaving his web of deceit by challenging the Word that God had spoken concerning the Tree of Knowledge. After he challenged the truth, the serpent continued on by replacing the truth with a lie. He told her that if she ate of the fruit, she would become like God. The lie that she chose to believe caused her to doubt the Word of God which, in essence, made her question the character of God.

The lie of the serpent broke the trust that Eve had placed in her Creator. Read Genesis chapter 3 and you’ll see that the moment her confidence in God’s Word being the truth was crushed, she saw that the fruit as something desirable. She replaced her trust in God for a desire. She desired the creation more than the Creator. As Christians, if we struggle with a lack of trust, then we’ll tend to worry, doubt, and/or be afraid. Worry can lead to overindulgence as a form of self-preservation. It can become our security blanket while living in a fallen world.

What’s the answer to overindulgence? The more we fill our hearts with the presence and the love of God, the less we will need external things to fill our lives. Jesus tells us in Matthew 5 that if we will hunger and thirst for righteousness, the Lord will fill us. Jesus also tells us in John 4, if we will drink of the water of life that He offers us, it will spring up as a well out of our inner being. In order for you to begin to experience the fullness of God in your life, you will have to trust Him. When He instructs you to put something down, simply obey His voice. It will be your trust and willingness to obey that will please the Father, and He will be allowed to reward you. Once you trust the Lord to the point of being free from the desire, the Lord might just give it back to you. He does this to show us that it isn’t the thing that is evil; it is the lack of trust in our heart that is evil.

If you desire to trust God, but thoughts of doubt prevent you from stepping out in faith, just ask Him to help you with your unbelief. All God is looking for is a sincere heart that chooses to love Him more than self. Once He finds such a person, because He seeks after true worshipers, then He will fill that heart with His love, liberty, and presence.  —submitted by Asa Dockery, US