you become like the treasure that you seek.

You're not generally angry because things are in the way of God and his kingdom purposes. You're angry because something or someone has gotten in the way of something you crave, something you think will inspire contentment, satisfaction, or happiness in you. Your heart is desperate to be inspired, and you get mad when your pursuits are blocked. Where you look for awe will fundamentally control the thoughts and emotions of your heart in ways you normally don't even realize.

The spiritual reality for many of us is that the one thing is not the Lord. And the danger in that reality is this: your one thing will control your heart, and whatever controls your heart will exercise inescapable influence over your words, choices, and actions. Your one thing will become that which shapes and directs your responses to the situations and relationships of your daily life. If the Lord isn't your one thing, the thing that is your one thing will be your functional lord.

The Psalms welcome us to a faith where God's agenda is more important than ours and where we are asked to live out our faith in the context of a disastrously broken world. But this is also precisely where we experience the highest personal joys, as we put our hope in the covenant love of the Lord and make the pursuit of his glory the goal of our lives.

There is woven inside each of us a desire for something more—a craving to be part of something bigger, greater, and more profound than our relatively meaningless day-by-day existence.

What do I really want in life: the success of God's agenda of grace or the fulfillment of my catalog of desires?

Here is one of the most beautiful fruits of grace—a heart that is content, more given to worship than demand and more given to the joy of gratitude than the anxiety of want.

the struggle of midlife is fundamentally rooted in the idolatries of the heart.

This war is a battle for the control of your heart, and whatever functionally rules your heart will then shape the way you see life and your desires, and it will control your words and behavior.

Ask yourself: What makes your good day a good day? What are the things that tend to make you happy and satisfied? What gives your life a sense of meaning and purpose? What are the things you faithfully pursue, and what are you hoping to experience once you get them? If I watched the video of your last year, what treasure would I conclude you're after?

Often we make the mistake of thinking we have a heart for the Lord, when really we're just thankful for him because at that moment he seems to be delivering to us what we have truly set our hearts on. Often we reduce God to just the deliverer of good fits, rather than recognizing him as the ultimate heart-satisfying gift.

you love the gifts and not the Giver, your heart will never be satisfied, but if you love the Giver, your heart will be content and you will be able to enjoy his gifts while keeping them in their proper place.