Price of stubbornness

There are so many times in scripture where we see God "turn them over to their own stubbornness" or "remove his hand from them" or "allowed them to walk in their own devices." This happens over and over again, and it is striking to realize this characteristic in God the Father. He will as often in Scripture say things like "Oh that my people would listen to me, that Israel would walk in my ways."

This is not the "Old Testament God", as if God goes away to summer camp between testaments to really work on Himself. This is Almighty unchanging God we see here. Jesus does give us an access to God and His grace we could never give to ourselves, but let us realize God's action toward our stubbornness has not changed.

There come times when we choose to disobey God enough times that He will just let us go down that road to experience the pain and the brokenness He would have protected us from if we had only listened and obeyed him in the first place.

This is sobering to our hearts that are prone to wander. We must intentionally keep our hearts focused, open, and obeying, or we may very well see God remove his hand from our stubborn hearts.

Prone to wander

Our hearts are truly and terribly wicked. THey need to ALWAYS be focused and disciplined to obey, follow, and love God above all else. But because of the fact that our hearts just really are so so wicked (depraved) there simply is no room for comfortable apathy in this life. Every day my heart is drawn toward its own wickedness, and I have to intentionally focus my heart each and every day on Jesus Christ and the God who demands that I follow Him and obey Him.

My heart is so easily turned away; like terribly easy to be turned away. This depravity and wickedness angers me. I hate that my heart is aligned toward sin and terrible choices, but over and over again I see this in my life.

O God, my heart is so wicked and prone to wander, I am truly prone to leave the God I love and turn from you.

Here is my heart, LORD, take and seal it for thy courts above. Seal and cap my heart for you and your alone. O God, my heart is prone to wander. It is so easily turned from you. Seal my heart. I hate my wickedness. I hate that I am always turning from you if I am not remembering the grace you have given me in Christ. I desire to follow you and lead your people with a fear of you, but heart pulls me.

My heart is depraved and wicked. While I have been redeemed in the blood of Christ on the cross, I still feel prone to wander and leave the path of the God I love. I hate and despise that feeling.

I also realize if I am not intentionally focusing my wandering heart, I will be too easily turned. So seal my heart. Draw me close to you and I will obey you. I will follow you and honor you.

With Psalm 80 I pray, "O God, restore me, and cause your face to shine upon me and I will be saved."

My heat is truly wicked and prone to wander from you. When I do wander, I find brokenness at every turn. So I pray for restoration, and I pray this on a consistent repeat.

Restoration is a return to an original condition before wear and tear and brokenness began to set in.

Addressing God

How do you address God in prayer? Is it personal or is it stale and rehearsed? Unless I find the right name to address God by, I have to question from the get go how free or real my connection with Him might be. If I can only address God on general terms, I cannot find a personal connection. If I have to put the word "the" before the term I use to address God, it is only an anonymous prayer. It is general and not personal.

There are moments you read through the Psalms and other spiritual writers to find a bursting prayer connection, and it most often comes from the address of God at the get go. Anthony Bloom says these moments "burst out with something which has the quality of a nickname, something which no one else could possibly say...which is made possible only because there is a relationship."

The Psalmist comes right out and says, "You are my Joy." Not that God is joy (which he is). Not that God is the Almighty (which He is). Our prayer becomes personal when we are not only stating facts about God, but when we come out of the gate personally addressing God with relational terms.

You are my God. You are my joy. You are my refuge. You are my greatest good...

Severed parts

All who are in Christ are in Christ together. We truly are connected in all the greatest ways because of the gospel.

The Body of Christ has been preached for centuries, but something I do not recall hearing about the body and its parts, which we are, is what happens when they are severed from the body.

The Body of Christ only grows when it is held together. When it is disconnected parts, those parts die and cannot continue forward. Stay close and connected to the gospel and to the Body of Christ.

Over and over again I watch people disconnect themselves from the Body of Christ and attempt to go it alone. With the fervor of Hebrews 10, I say, "DO NOT give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing. " I have told people more times than I care to count: if you attempt to grow and move on your own, you will fail. If we play out the realities of a Body, not only will you fail, your will likely die.

Swatting at Doves

We most often are moving and going so frantically that God’s peace and blessing cannot land upon us.

If God’s peace descends like a dove, I am all but swatting it away with my hectic grasping after success as defined by the American Church Dream.

My priority is to be concentrated on Abba. His closeness is my ultimate good, and not my success as is demanded of me. I spend too much of my heart, mind, energy, and time comparing myself to others.

Abba, I need you. I need you to be close to my heart and mind. I need your peace if I can just sit still long enough that it might descend upon me.

Cold prayers

When I think honestly about my prayers, I think of all the warm, deep, and intense prayers I can give in the concerns which matter the most to me. When it comes to those things, my heart is open, and all of my center is engaged. Does that mean that God is my priority? Nope! It only means that what I am praying about matters to me.

When I make my passionate, deep, and intense prayers about things I really care about, I move right on to the next thing, and that thing does not matter as much. Suddenly, my prayer goes cold and routine. Has God changed? Of course not. Has he grown cold and routine? Clearly not!

It only means that all my passion and intensity was not because of God's presence and closeness to me. It had nothing to do with my faith or longing for Him and Him alone. It was only about my concerns, not for God.

On God opening and closing doors

"If you only knew..." God says with the tears of Jesus in Luke 19:42 that I am held accountable for what I refuse to see or am unable to see.

Sometimes God opens a door I refuse to go through. And when God shuts a door, that door will never be opened again. There will be other doors, yes, but it serves to remind me that sometimes doors are shut that never needed to be if I had only gone through them while they were open.

Blameless

"(22)For I have kept the ways of the LORDAnd have not acted wickedly against my God... (25)According to my cleanness before His eyes." -2 Samuel 22:22,25

It is difficult to believe verse 22 without reading verse 25. David would not be blameless in our eyes. In our eyes, David is an adulterer and murderer.

In God's mercy-tinted eyes, David is forgiven and blameless. How God sees us is all that is truly important.

Do not overlook the rescue

Anything you come through is by the grace and activity of God.

Also, anything you did not ever have to go through is by the grace and activity of God.

Thank God today for all the things you have been spared from having to go through.

Far be it from me

"No! I will surely buy it from you for a price, for I will not offer burnt offerings to the LORD my God which cost me nothing." 2 Samuel 24:24 My worship and my very life is a sacrifice (Rom. 12) offered to God. This verse is one of my favorite reminders that we are always to bring out best to God. It ought to be a sacrifice. It ought to cost me something or it is not a sacrifice. If it cost me nothing it is too comfortable to be called worship. It is too easy to be called sacrifice.

Far be it from me to keep coming to each Sunday with worship I am not even invested in. Far be it from me to keep living a life for Christ that cost me nothing.

Loving eyes

His love is more potent than any other because His eyes are more powerful than the rest His eyes see through the filth and crust they see through perversion

His eyes caught and catch glimpses of the Divine intention hidden in every person in every way His first loving act is to give new eyes