Wednesday, April 27, 2016

Do You Want God's Comfort Or Just To Be Comfortable?

My Utmost For His Highest
 
Do you seek great things for yourself? —Jeremiah 45:5
 
“God wants you to be in a much closer relationship with Himself than simply receiving His gifts— He wants you to get to know Him. Even some large thing we want is only incidental; it comes and it goes. […] There is nothing easier than getting into the right relationship with God, unless it is not God you seek, but only what He can give you.  If you have only come as far as asking God for things, you have never come to the point of understanding the least bit of what surrender really means. You have become a Christian based on your own terms. You protest, saying, “I asked God for the Holy Spirit, but He didn’t give me the rest and the peace I expected.” And instantly God puts His finger on the reason– you are not seeking the Lord at all; you are seeking something for yourself. […] Are you prepared to ask yourself what it is you want from God and why you want it? God always ignores your present level of completeness in favor of your ultimate future completeness. He is not concerned about making you blessed and happy right now, but He’s continually working out His ultimate perfection for you— “…that they may be one just as We are one…” (John 17:22).”  CHAMBERS
 
Someone once said “God is more concerned with our character than our comfort.”  Think about that.  Then think about the myriad of testimonies that you have heard in the past that focused on God bringing comfort.  God is the God of all comfort (2 Corinthians 1) but that does not mean that comfort is primary.  Relationship is primary.  And I am not suggesting that if I seek God out that He will solve all of my earthly problems.  Our relationship to the Father through the Son by faith is spiritual.  Yet we tend to see our faith through the prism of the physical.  Our challenge is to become one with the Father as Jesus was one with the Father, and that was not physical.  Jesus had nowhere to lay his head. (Matthew 8:20) He was despised and rejected by those He came to save (John 1:11) It is because of the strength of our spiritual relationship with the Father that we have the capacity to endure these physical lives of ours. No matter what may come our way. And,  “Because He lives, I can face tomorrow.  Because He lives, all fear is gone.  Because I know Who holds the future.  Life is worth the living.  Just, because He lives. God sent His Son, they called Him Jesus.” As Christians we must get our focus right.  Stop living like the rest of the world having no hope, scrambling to survive each day, limited to what we can make of it. But seek first the kingdom of God.  Trust in the Lord.  Love God with all of your heart.  Be anxious for nothing. Live by faith and not by sight. Get your focus and priorities in their proper place.  That is the life you have been called to.  That is the life you embraced when you yielded your heart to Jesus.  Don’t miss the joy that you will find there.  ELGIN
 
John 15:9-11  Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love. If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.”
 
Charley Elgin

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