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Discussion Forum : Devotional Thoughts : Getting used to God

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hmmhmm
Member



Joined: 2006/1/31
Posts: 4994
Sweden

 Getting used to God

I just wanted to share a few thoughts that have been in the hallways of my mind today, It struck me as I was riding my bicycle home from the store that what Vance Haven speaks about in his sermon ”getting used to the dark” is very true. In more areas as that brother Havner mentions in his sermon. We get used to much, we get used to sin, worldliness and all those things, someone said that much of our Christianity or things common in today’s Christian world where abominable to our unsaved grandparents’, whether right or wrong we can see that it is so, what was an outrage to one generation is embraced by the next.
We see also in history the reverse, times of raising up a standard, aiming for the scripture says and People trying to get out of the ”dark”. But my thoughts today was not on sin and worldliness so much, rather that we get used to God, It is incredible true God should in a sense be common and familiar to us, he is our Father, and I believe calling him ”daddy” as a child would for his father , that spirit is a blessed one. But what I am getting at is God becoming so familiar we take him for granted, the awesomeness of who God is , how great and incomprehensible he truly is, the Holy awe for Him and His character becomes diluted into just a common thing. I live in the west, I live in Sweden, and few countries throughout mankind’s history have had such a good standard of living as we do. I take for granted when I go to my kitchen and turn the faucet on there are either warm or cold water for my choice, I take for granted there will be water in my shower. I think not much on these things, I have been accustomed to these things, I take them for granted, and many would if they found out one morning that there were no warm water would complain to their landlord about the matter.
And I have noticed for me after a few years from time to time it is easy to slide into such a similar state with God, we take Him for granted. He is just there in our life; I take for granted I can come to him in prayer, I can go to meetings, I can pick up my bible, in several translations and read, and I can do so many things, and take them all for granted. Yet I have the knowledge many on our earth do not have these privileges as I do, many have no church, many would risk their freedom and life for owning a bible, many more don’t have all the other things as water or even a bed to sleep in, while I take them for granted, that is how things have been from my birth and throughout my life, I take them for granted.
But when I think about it, how much greater should my thankfulness be? I should be weeping for joy that I can read the word every day, I should tremble in holy fear and awe that I.... a small filthy sinner like me have been saved and can at any given moment enter the holy of holies to be in his presence.
God who created all things, that is such an easy phrase to spit out, but does those words mean anything to us? Or have they become common to me? Consider the universe, God created it, how vast it is! I watched a documentary about it, the Hubble telescope took a picture where millions of stars galaxies etc where visible, it would take millions of light-years to travel there..... millions of years traveling by the speed of light.... and my God who I take for granted so often, he spoke that into existence, even more amazing is I Can call him Father, and I can make him look down upon me ....tiny me, a dust in this infinite universe, in his infinite creation he can turn his eyes down upon me and look towards me with love and compassion.
These things should make me tremble with joy and fear and awe, what should enter our minds as we hear the word God? I have many things enter my mind, but somewhere I have taken God for granted, he has become common to me, just as any other object in life.
I think the need for me, and probably for many others, is a fresh revelation of God himself. Today much in Christianity is common, churches are common, in my part of the world, believers are common, at least those who claim to know God, bibles are common, talk about God is very common, theological discussions are common. But how common is men that utterly fear God and can enter a place of awe by hearing the word God, men and women who live by sight in their spiritual being, men and women that have gazed upon God, the creator of all things....
Do I even realize I know him? How often do I litterly fall on my face before him just because he is?
Far too seldom, that God would reveal himself to me, that he would be God in my life.
Also I realized, the true eternal God we can never be accustomed to, he can never be common, since he is all else but common, He is God, the eternal and most high being. My lonnging is that I could be as enoch....

”He walked with God”.....

It is so easy to live this life and not see God one time, I fear multitudes of believers having lived one, ten, twenty years and never once seen God for who he really is. He is just a common thing, person to them, he is there and all things that are involved in the Christian life are just there, as the water in the faucet, as the light when you hit the light switch. It’s just there, nothing”wow” about it, but take someone who never seen these things, a man who has lived in some remote jungle for all his life, bring him in my house and I bet he would go”woooooow” when I showed him the faucet with running water, I bet he could spend hours just turning the thing on and off. He would be amazed at this thing. And sadly I am rarely amazed at God, God help me and reveal himself to me afresh.

God bless you all

Christian


_________________
CHRISTIAN

 2009/10/1 15:22Profile
IWantAnguish
Member



Joined: 2006/6/15
Posts: 343


 Re: Getting used to God

Sometimes I feel, and I believe many others feel as if we are idolaters.

How so?

Because God is so infinite in His attributes that we can never truly know Him as He really is.

He constantly shatters our image of Him into something much bigger and much grander the moment we think we have Him all figured out.

Revelation after revelation, let us strive to know Him more and more on this side of eternity.


_________________
Sba

 2009/10/1 16:08Profile
InTheLight
Member



Joined: 2003/7/31
Posts: 2850
Phoenix, Arizona USA

 Re: Getting used to God

May the Lord give us a childlike sense of awe and wonder again. I'm reminded of something Tozer wrote in the preface to [i]The Pursuit of God[/i]...

In this hour of all-but-universal darkness one cheering gleam appears: within the fold of conservative Christianity there are to be found increasing numbers of persons whose religious lives are marked by a growing hunger after God Himself. They are eager for spiritual realities and will not be put off with words, nor will they be content with correct `interpretations' of truth. They are athirst for God, and they will not be satisfied till they have drunk deep at the Fountain of Living Water. This is the only real harbinger of revival which I have been able to detect anywhere on the religious horizon. It may be the cloud the size of a man's hand for which a few saints here and there have been looking. It can result in a resurrection of life for many souls and a recapture of that radiant wonder which should accompany faith in Christ, that wonder which has all but fled the Church of God in our day.


_________________
Ron Halverson

 2009/10/1 19:54Profile









 Re: Getting used to God


Brother hmmhmm - this post is even better than even you realize

GOD Bless it!


and you & yours.


Quote:
God who created all things, that is such an easy phrase to spit out, but does those words mean anything to us? Or have they become common to me?



Creator GOD was on that cross.

Quote:
I think the need for me, and probably for many others, is a fresh revelation of God himself.





 2009/10/1 23:47
HeartSong
Member



Joined: 2006/9/13
Posts: 3179


 Re: Getting used to God

Quote:
But what I am getting at is God becoming so familiar we take him for granted . . .


As I was driving down the road today, I was contemplating this very thing - and the horror of it. Things have been so busy lately, that it seems that I have to force myself towards Him - almost as if I am drifting into a different orbit and have to turn on the boosters to get out of it.

My quiet times have been being cut short and there has been constant chaos all about me. Blessedly He has afforded me four whole days of immersing myself in Him - and so, as I drove down the road today, just He and I, surrounded by His beautiful creation, I praised Him, and worshiped Him, and had the most delightful time as He turned on the light and danced amongst the raindrops that were lingering in the fields of freshly watered grass. The beautiful golden rays chasing away the retreating clouds and lighting up the heavens with His glory. Oh praise His holy name!

 2009/10/2 0:15Profile
HeartSong
Member



Joined: 2006/9/13
Posts: 3179


 Re:


What is interesting, is that I prayed for you today Christian (while I was driving). I wonder if praying for someone causes them to have similar thoughts - or maybe it is the thought that brings about the prayer.

 2009/10/2 2:59Profile
enid
Member



Joined: 2006/5/22
Posts: 2680
Nottingham, England

 Re: Getting used to God

What it would be if we were like Enoch and pleased God.

That was his testimony, Hebrews 11v5.

Let it be ours.

God bless.

 2009/10/2 3:16Profile
hmmhmm
Member



Joined: 2006/1/31
Posts: 4994
Sweden

 Re:

hello all, that Tozer excerpt is very good and true, thank you for praying Heartsong, i really appreciate it. And i dont know if prayer makes someone else think alike :-) it is possible, or if it is the other way around, however, the spirit is the same that dwells inside us all, and maybe he sometimes leads several of his children towards that which HE is longing for in them, I think our world is very strange in todays times, there are so much that penetrate our being, from outside, it is hard to go 24 hours and not be just exploited to all kinds of things, cellphones, tv, news, work place , co workers , advertisements, commercials etc etc. There is so much that could effect us and somehow "stress" us out and take our mind of that which matter the most.

God.


_________________
CHRISTIAN

 2009/10/2 3:20Profile









 Re:

Quote:
the spirit is the same that dwells inside us all, and maybe he sometimes leads several of his children towards that which HE is longing for in them



Amen!

 2009/10/2 18:24





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