Are you willing to be honest with where you are at this point?”, was the question I asked this leader. It wasn’t that he didn’t know his actual GPS co-ordinates. This was a much bigger question that was implicating him, his team, his family and his community. Where ‘was’ he?
This leader was wrestling with rote answers he typically provided when I would ask him “How are you experiencing God lately?”. Conditioned to say that all was well, he began to outline all the religious activities he had in place. Regular reading of the scriptures, attending a local church community, engaging in bible study were the well intended answers thought to be all that was required. They were not. With deep respect to my friend, he missed the root of the question.
How would you answer?
It had become clear that he was operating with a deep sense of disconnect with the One who made him. Somehow, he had translated growing in his intimacy with Christ as one matched to activity.
Although it is helpful for us to engage in religious activities; on their own, they can leave us wanting, empty and feeling disconnected from the One who made us. Somehow we feel distant, far away from Him.
So, how would you answer the question, “Where are you as you seek to experience God more and more?”
Are we not like Adam? In Genesis 2:8-9 Adam “hears” God walking nearby so he and his wife hide – they move away from Him. And yet, God pursues them.
“Then the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”
Can you “hear” Him calling you just like He called Adam – “Where are you”? How are you responding? Are you moving towards the One you claim to be Lord? Or, is it possible you are trying to hide…moving in a different direction?
On one hand, it is “easy” to proclaim Jesus as Lord with our mouths. It is a different story to be engaged in such a way that our lives echo a deep, intimate, personal and resounding belief that Jesus is renovating us from the inside out.
Let me invite you to pause and confess your deep need for Him as you reflect on the following verses?
“You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” Jeremiah 29:13 NIV
“You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you, in a dry and parched land where there is no water.” Psalm 63:1 NIV
“Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.” Psalm 37:4 NIV
“Come close to God, and God will come close to you. Wash your hands, you sinners; purify your hearts, for your loyalty is divided between God and the world.” James 4:8 NLT
You and I need to know “where we are”, as we consider who we are and whose we are. To not acknowledge and embrace the gap is to declare that you are OK on your own, apart from Him.
Are you engaged in:
Seeking Him,
Delighting in Him,
Thirsting for Him,
Longing for Him,
Coming close to Him?
His Word is clear that no one comes to Him unless the Father draws them to Him, John 6:44NLT so ask Him. Ask Him to help you seek, delight, thirst, long for and come close to Him. Ask Him to help you move towards Him.
In the past, I would often ignore the sense of disconnect in my inner person as I engaged in my “spiritual disciplines”. In some ways, I was complicit in my proclaiming “Christ with my lips while my heart was far from Him”. Although far from perfect, I am not so inclined now.
How about you – where are you?
A Maverick Application:
- Where are you, relative to the One you profess to be Lord of you and your business? Is there anything that has you wanting to hide from Him?
- What’s your response as you reflect on the above verses? Are you moving towards Him or away from Him?
- Ask Him to help you move towards Him. Declare clearly your inability to do this work on your own.
- Trust Him to do this good work in you.
- Who can you share this with?
