What do you desire most in life? Health? Success? To be famous? Marriage? Money? Love?
God sees everything on our hearts. He is aware of what we desire, go through, fear, long for, and worry about.
It is amazing how God desires to take first place in our hearts. The God who created all there is and has made us so intricate, complex, and special desires our heart and commitment! What a delightful and astounding thought!
So many long for health, success, fame, marriage, money, love, etc, yet none of this can truly satisfy. How many celebrities are there who despite all of their money, fame, fans, and possessions feel alone? How many people long for success and fame, all the while to discover that it brings endlessly chasing after a distant dream (or when having attained it, still continuing to chase, strive and work, work, work to maintain or acquire more!) How many desire to be married and be loved...and yet we often hear of many marriages ending in divorce or lacking the love relationship that once may have been at the beginning of the relationship. How many long for money; to just pay bills, to just get that house, to just be able to support our kids through college...and yet it too brings responsibility, diligence, and hard labor to acquire and maintain.
What is it that satisfies? What is it that brings true contentment - whether we are in want or have plenty? What is it that brings freedom and joy? A real relationship with God through His dear Son, Jesus Christ. Not the typical "relationship" that you see exemplified in the lives of so many who claim to be the church though. And surely not through those who claim to know God, all the while living in almost complete opposition to how God calls believers to live in His word, the Bible.
I like the quote, "You are a Christian when God IS your life." (Remember, it is a process of growing in our relationship with the Lord by sticking to it through thick and thin)
My motto is, "Being a genuine Christian shows evidence by God becoming more of your everything over time!"
I am by no means claiming to be perfect or saying I have it all together by the above statements. I will say though how different my life is now that I have begun treating my relationship with God as the priority above priorities...seeing and treasuring and longing for the One worthy of a daily commitment...with the recognition that truly, if the God of the universe is real, if His word is truth, if Jesus Christ really is God and He died on the cross as the payment for our sins, dying in our place, on our behalf...it surely is a curious thing why we "Christians" feel that saying a few sporadic prayers through out the day, attending church weekly, or reading the Bible casually is enough to suffice or is all that God requires. God desires to have an intimate love relationship with us; His children, the Redeemed, His Beloved. And yet, watching television or going to the gym for hours or our hobbies/interests have the tendency to take precedence over our commitment to the Lord, at least by the amount of time we devout to them and the lack of time we invest in our walk with the Lord.
I remember my step dad (I hate the term "step" when referring to a parent. Typically it is the step parent who is around more and there for the kids, so I am sure my dislike of this term is understandable!) saying years ago that as Christians, we should be on our faces before God daily. Truly, if there is anyone worthy of true worship and adoration...it is God.
Let us cry out to the Lord, asking Him to purge, refine, and sanctify us, to remove that which vows to take His place in our hearts, to help us prioritize our time so that He is first, and to incline our hearts to Him.
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