I would like to think that every day is going to be a perfect day of balanced emotions and dedicated service to God. A day when I will trust him in every moment, good and bad, while I keep a sweet song in my heart. I would like to think that I will love with perfection, always forgiving and never seeking my own interest ahead of someone else's. I would like to think this of every day but truth be told, some days suck.
We do it to ourselves. God plans great things for us every day, whether the sun is shining or not. But we seem to have a trust issue, where yesterday he took care of us but today we think he won't. Sometimes it is just emotions that get away on us and suddenly God doesn't seem so big or so important any more. What that guy or girl did to us is more important than spending time with God. We fill the day moping about, feeling sorry for ourselves or being angry about something that at the end of time will seem ridiculous. When we realize what we have done we try to repair things with God, we try to come into his presence, we try to get intimate again but there seems to be a barrier; a barrier of our making:
Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God. (Psalm 43:5)
We know we need God, we know we need that intimacy, we know we need to be assured by his presence but we just don't know how to get there. We read his Word - nothing. We listen to worship songs - our mind wonders. We try to pray - but our words sound hollow. Perhaps we feel that these words of the psalmist were written by our heart:
You are God my stronghold.
Why have you rejected me?
Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy? (Psalm 43:2)
That's how it begins to feel, like you have been rejected by God and turned over to the enemy. That's because we forget one very important part: We cannot rescue ourselves.
We have to remember that Jesus Christ did not come because we asked him to come. He came because the Father sent him. It is impossible for us to respond to God unless he is calling to us. We can`t have revival by our own design, it must be as a response to God`s call back to him. We cannot turn our heart around or force our way into the presence of God; we have to be invited:
Send forth your light and your truth,
let them guide me;
let them bring me to your holy mountain, to the place where you dwell. (Psalm 43:3)
Instead of telling God how to fix us or our situation or even how to change someone else, we should simply ask him to call to us so we can respond. We can sit there in that dark place and try to dictate to God and get nowhere or we can simply say "send me your light so I can go to your holy mountain". In other words, "Lord call to me, let me hear my name so I can turn to you and see you. I want to respond to your voice, to your presence. I can't see you right now, send your light so I can see how to return to you." It is when we are able to respond to his call, his voice that we enter his presence by his invitation and we are able to worship:
Then will I go to the altar of God,
to God, my joy and my delight.
I will praise you with the harp, O God, my God. (Psalm 43:4)
We have to stop dictating the terms and understand that it is always by God's grace, his will, his invitation. We don't invite him into our lives, he invites us into his presence. He is not our servant, our genie in the bottle; we are his and that is the most comforting thought we could possess. We belong to him and if we mess up he will always be calling us to him but we have to realize that. We have to stop talking, begging, pleading and simply say "Call to me so I can respond".
Stop trying to rescue yourself today. Ask him to call to you, to send his light so that you can see his way, and then stop talking and instead listen. Don't be like the prodigal son with a plan in mind of how you will manipulate your way back into God's great grace. Simply tell him you are lost, you messed up, you are sorry and you need a rescue. Then listen for his response and see that great light he sends to bring you home. He loves you. You belong to him. You are his child. He is calling to you. Just listen. Ask him to call again and just listen. When you hear his voice, get up and RUN to him!
Run to him, leaving the darkness behind and burst into his presence as only his invited child has the honour of doing. Ask right now, "Call to me daddy so I can come to you!"
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