Why I 'need' a woman.

I was walking on Cal State's campus today feeling like a curious love child of a bobble head and a whip lash victim. My neck is frustratingly set on a swivel that is connected to some sort of woman-sensing radar. My eyes scan and my neck jerks to a target. It's a habit years in the making that has proven incredibly difficult to deal with. I find that I do this even when I really don't want to. It is ingrained in me. My behavior is second nature, as if programmed. Pertaining to this habit, a particularly distressing aspect of my character was revealed to me today.

I will often look at a woman's eyes as she walks towards me. I often have sunglasses on so she can't tell. I realize this makes me sound like a creeper but bear with me (we are all of us creepers). This touches on a deep seated need of acceptance for me. It hit me that if I catch a woman glancing my way then she is approving of me. In other words, there is something about me that is worthy of her attention. Yet if everything happens as I desire it to, I find that it never leaves me feeling accepted for more than a few moments and simply gives me a short lived burst of pride and egotism. My pride proclaims me King of the Hill when reality has set my foot on a grain of sand.

What a valuable lesson this was for me though! I do have a need for acceptance. We all do. Everyone proclaims the virtue of selfless love and acceptance of others' faults. But this only reveals how terrible we are at filling that need for one another. I'm looking to steal a passing glance when Jesus gave me His everlasting attention on the cross! He limped to His death for me so I could stride into His glorious life! God was saying to me in three different ways that He has set the fullness of His gaze upon me with mercy and acceptance:

First truth: God has said to me, "I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you." (Psalm 32:8)

Second truth: Wisdom cries out that, "The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and his ears are attentive to their cry." (Psalm 34:15)

Third truth: The Spirit speaks to our hearts and says, "The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace."(Numbers 6:24-26)

I need to hear those truths that God will teach me, bear with me and bless me because I am a weak willed, fragile and small creature. You need to know that God will be with you too. In the hands of our Redeemer, nothing is wasted.