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Proverbs 2:1 — My child, listen to what I say, and treasure my commands.
Chip Ingram, in his book “God, As He Longs for You to See Him” makes the statement, ‘God has created each of us with an innate desire for deep, meaningful fellowship with him.’
We know this to be true from the very beginning for the Bible gives us a brief glimpse into the heart of God when we’re told in Genesis that God walked each evening with Adam and Eve. He talked with them as you would talk with an intimate friend.
While sin placed a barrier between God and man, it didn’t destroy God’s desire for that intimacy that was lost in the garden. When Jesus died for us, the barrier was destroyed and fellowship with God was available once again!
The problem is, the enemy doesn’t want us to realize what a marvelous position we have with God. Our vision of God is clouded with religion, tradition, lies and misunderstandings. So, can we really know God as he wants us to know him? YES!! But how?
Proverbs 2:1-5 gives us path we can follow to know God as he wants to be known. I’ll warn you though, it’s not an easy path to follow. However, it’s well worth the journey.
Proverbs 2:1 tells us, “My child, listen to what I say, and treasure my commands.”
The first step in knowing God is to listen. Listening is a lost art in our society. There are so many distractions calling us away from God. Here’s what I’m learning about listening:
- Remove distractions. In my physical life that may mean putting the phone/device down, turning down the TV and/or turning my body in the direction of the one I’m listening to. With God it’s a similar thing. Put away the distractions, get alone when you can give him your undivided attention.
- Eye Contact is crucial! It amazes me how much power is behind looking the person you are listening to/talking to has. When you are talking and looking each other in the eyes it seems to put a connection that isn’t easily taken away. The same is true with God. Physical eye contact isn’t possible of course, but train yourself to focus on one object as you seek him. It could be a distant object. It could be a picture or a verse. This one is a tough one, but your Heavenly Father WANTS to build this relationship. When you look into the eyes of God you don’t see judgment, anger or hate, you see love, grace, mercy and passion for you.
- See the Love. I’ll confess to you that I may be the world’s biggest sap. However, although we’ve been together for years, there are times when I look into my wife’s eyes and she still takes my breath away. Why? Because I love this woman more than anyone (except Jesus of course). When you seek to know God try to envision the passionate love he has for you. He loved you so much he gave the one thing he cherished most, his son.
To know God as he wants you to know him is to learn to see the great love he has for you and listen to him through His Word (The Holy Bible) and prayer.
PRAYER: Father, there are so many distractions that keep me from really knowing you. Empower me to listen to you, to focus on you, and to see the passion in your eyes for me. I’ve failed you so many times but I want to know you more. Help me to see you in your glory. Amen.
I heard about you from others; now I have seen you with my own eyes. Job 42:5 (CEV)
I remember the conversation like yesterday. KoMy son, a recent college graduate was looking for car insurance. Part of our agreement was that we would pay his car insurance until he graduated from college and landed his first ‘real job’. The time had come and we rejoiced. Not only for his new job, but for our decrease in auto insurance!
“Dad,” my first born said, “You would not BELIEVE how much they want for car insurance! It’s outrageous!”
“How much?” A smirk was already crossing my face and I was glad we were on the phone. He told me the amount, an amount comparable to what we’d been paying for the previous 8 years.
“Really?” I said matter-of-factly, “that’s about what we’ve been paying for you.”
There was silence on the other end of the line. Reality had sunk in. I could have shown my son every insurance bill from the first time he drove the car. I could have copied the checks and sent them to him every time I paid the bill, but until the money coming from his pocket was his own, the reality would not set it.
We don’t know how long Job and his friends had been discussing God’s actions, but we know there came a time when God finally ‘appeared’ to Job. There’s no indication that Job actually saw God, but his revelation of God was awakened as God asked him a series of questions which humbled Job, stopped him dead in his tracks. Suddenly Job realized how great and awesome God was and how small and ignorant he was.
Job was a righteous man. Even God attested to his righteousness before Satan. Job knew ABOUT God, but until that day of revelation he didn’t really KNOW GOD. Once he ‘saw’ God two things happened. First of all, he saw God in a whole new light of awe and understanding. Secondly, he saw himself in a whole new light. That’s important. We can’t clearly see who we are until we have a clear view of who God is.
Isaiah spoke against the sins of Israel and the surrounding kingdoms. But when he saw God his response was quite different. “Woe is me” he lamented, “I am a man of unclean lips.”
How we act towards others and react to events of our lives have a great deal to do with how we see ourselves. How we see ourselves depends on how we view God’s view of us. Speaking evil of me has no affect on me if I’m secure in my vision of God’s love for me. In the same way I can be more accepting of you, regardless of our differences, if I live with the realization that both of us are creations of the living God.
Gain a fresh view of yourself and others by focusing on the reality of who God is.
PRAYER: Almighty God, I thank you and praise you for your love for me. Reveal yourself to me in a new way today so that I can see myself and others as you see us. In Jesus name, Amen.
The ways of God are without fault. The Lord’s words are pure. He is a shield to those who trust him. Psalm 18:30 (NCV)
We all want to believe in a God of love. Even the atheist wishes there was a God. To them the God they wish they saw simply doesn’t exist based on the perception of how they want the world to operate. In order to ‘not believe in God’ they have a picture in their minds of the God they don’t believe in, a God they wish they had.
The agnostic doubts the existence of the God in their mind. They, like the atheist, evaluate the ‘evidence’ they have gathered in their minds. Their ‘God-picture’ is too fuzzy to know for sure if it exists. They may hope there is a God, but the God of their own definition.
When God doesn’t do what we want him to do it’s never easy to handle. It never has been. When that happens we can react by getting angry with God and give up on this thing we call faith. We can question his actions, his existence, his love for us, or the truth of his word. That doesn’t change who God is, it changes who we are.
We can get angry with ourselves or give up on us. We can tell ourselves God’s demands are too great. We convince ourselves that his ways are irrelevant, or rationalize our way through life by saying things like: “I’m better than they are; I can worship him on my own (which usually means not at all); If he really did love me he would….” But getting angry with ourselves only robs us of the joy we can have through Jesus.
We can blame others. Take God out of the picture completely. If they hadn’t done this, I’d be okay. I get no respect here, I can’t [do my job; get good grades; be the parent I should be; succeed] in this environment because of they way ‘they’ treat me.
But when God doesn’t act the way we want there is one more thing we can do. It’s the hardest of all to do because it can go against everything our finite, human minds tell us to do. When God doesn’t do things the way we want him to we may have to admit the maybe, just maybe, he knows more about this journey called life than we do.
He’s walked the road you’ve walked. He’s prepared the way for you. He never promised a care-free life here on earth, but he promised to walk with you through illness, divorce, financial collapse, natural disasters, and even your own failures and mistakes.
His ways are without fault, but sometimes they are also without understanding. That doesn’t change who he is, it only offers you an opportunity to grow in faith that he will do what he says he’ll do.
PRAYER: Father God, help me to grow in faith during those times I don’t understand your ways. Keep me from anger towards you, myself or others when things don’t go as I wish. Help me to lean on your words and trust you for my protection. In your name, Amen.
Mike Fisk & Built with Grace 