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    Desire Study Guide
    Desire Study Guide
    Desire Study Guide
    Ebook180 pages1 hour

    Desire Study Guide

    By John Eldredge

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    About this ebook

    "Above all else," Scripture urges, "guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life" -Proverbs 4:23

     But how?  How do we follow this warning?  How do we protect our hearts in this dangerous story in which we live? It all depends, says John Eldredge, on how you handle desire. "How you handle your heart's desire is how you handle your heart.  And how you handle desire also reeals what you think of God.  We've been told to kill desire and call it sanctification.  But there is another way." In this companion to the book Desire, Craig McConnell and John Eldredge show you the path to a deeper, more passionate, and more fulfilling walk with God by helping you recover and navigate the deep desires of your heart. Designed for personal use and for study groups, this guide will help you:
    • Uncover the desires God has placed in your heart when he made you.
    • Resurrect your heart from disappointment and unmet desire, so you can hope and dream again.
    • Expose the impostors that cheat our desires and trap our hearts in addiction.
    • Embrace desire as an act of faith.
    • Walk with God in the journey of desire.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherZondervan
    Release dateOct 14, 2007
    ISBN9781418566104
    Desire Study Guide
    Author

    John Eldredge

    John Eldredge is a bestselling author, a counselor, and a teacher. He is also president of Wild at Heart, a ministry devoted to helping people discover the heart of God, recover their own hearts in God's love, and learn to live in God's kingdom. John and his wife, Stasi, live in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

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      Book preview

      Desire Study Guide - John Eldredge

      DESIRE STUDY GUIDE

      1

      © 2007 by John Eldredge

      All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotation in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

      Published in Nashville, Tennessee. Thomas Nelson is a trademark of Thomas Nelson, Inc.

      Thomas Nelson, Inc. titles may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, fund-raising, or sales promotional use. For information, please e-mail SpecialMarkets@ThomasNelson.com.

      Scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. © 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved. Additional Scripture quotations are taken from the following sources:

      (NLT) New Living Translation, Holy Bible. New Living Translation © 1996, 2004 by Tyndale Charitable Trust. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers.

      (The Message) Scripture taken from The Message. © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

      Desire Study Guide

      ISBN: 1-4185-2857-9

      ISBN-13: 978-1-4185-2857-7

      Printed in the United States of America

      07 08 09 10 11 RRD 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

      CONTENTS

      MILE ONE — Our Heart’s Deepest Secret

      MILE TWO — The Dilemma of Desire

      MILE THREE — Dare We Desire?

      MILE FOUR — Disowned Desire

      MILE FIVE — Mocking Our Desire—The Impostors

      MILE SIX — The Divine Thwarter

      MILE SEVEN — The Great Restoration

      MILE EIGHT — The Grand Affair

      MILE NINE — The Adventure Begins

      MILE TEN — Entering More Deeply into Desire

      MILE ELEVEN — Letting Go

      MILE TWELVE — Keeping Heart—To the End

      MILE ONE

      OUR HEART’S

      DEEPEST SECRET

      It seems to me we can never give up longing and wishing while we are alive. There are certain things we feel to be beautiful and good, and we must hunger for them.

      —George Eliot

      As you set out on the first leg of your journey, it might be good to remember what it was like to begin the first day of exercise, or a new job, or the next grade level at school in the fall. It felt a little awkward at first, didn’t it? It took time to find your stride. This guidebook will probably feel the same way. Remember—our desires often seem a secret that may surface at times and then hide again in the deeper places of our heart. Recalling these defining desires cannot be rushed, or for that matter, orchestrated. It takes time, reflection, and allowing your heart to be moved as you sort through things.

      SETTING FORTH

      What is the secret set within each of our hearts? (pp. 1–2)

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      Your existence has a deep meaning. Yet for most of us, it remains hidden, shrouded, buried beneath all the other pressures and demands and busyness of life. But it doesn’t go away. Your life has a secret, something written deep in your heart.

      What does John mean, Life comes to us all as a mystery? (p. 2)

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      Isn’t there a life you have been searching for all your days? You may not always be aware of your search, and there are times when you seem to have abandoned looking altogether. But again and again it returns to us, this yearning that cries out for the life we prize . . . You see, even while we are doing other things, getting on with life, we still have an eye out for the life we secretly want. When someone seems to have gotten it together we wonder, how did he do it? Maybe if we read the same book, spent time with him, went to his church, things would come together for us as well. You see, we can never entirely give up our quest. (pp. 1, 11)

      Is there anything about someone else’s life that really looks good to you right now?

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      WHISPERS OF JOY

      The clue as to who we really are and why we are here comes to us through our heart’s desire. But it comes in surprising ways, and so often goes unnoticed, or misunderstood.

      Unearthing our desire isn’t a quick and easy thing. So start with just a good moment from the last few weeks—something that may seem rather simple, but it made you glad.

      What happened? Why was it a good moment?

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      How have other hints come to you? What are the movies and music, the people, events, and places that have really stirred your heart over the past few years? Just name them here.

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      ECHOES FROM THE PAST

      What are the two extremes which people tend to go to handle the past? Which do you tend toward? Why?

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      SHOUTS OF LAMENT

      Now for the more difficult side of desire. It’s hard for most of us to talk about our losses. But the secret of our hearts is also coming to us even in our greatest losses.

      What has been one of your greatest losses or disappointments? Whom or what did you lose, and what did the loss mean to you?

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      Simone Weil says there are only two things that pierce the human heart . . .

      What are they?

      Moments we wish would last forever and moments we wish had never begun.

      What are we to make of these messengers? How are we to interpret what they are saying? (p. 8)

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      THE SAME OLD THING

      What does John consider the unthinkable symptom of losing Paradise? (p. 9)

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      How has life turned out differently from the way you thought it would?

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      Now, what if I told you that life as you now experience it will go on forever just as it is, without improvement of any kind? Your health will stay as it is; your finances will remain as they are, your relationships, your work, all of it. (p. 10)

      React to that with as much honesty as you can muster.

      IN DEFENSE OF DISCONTENT

      What may discontent with our life indicate?

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      By the grace of God, we cannot quite pull it off.

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