Going Deeper with God

Isa 33:19 “Thou shalt not see a fierce people, a people of a deeper speech than thou canst perceive; of a stammering tongue, that thou canst not understand.”

Going Deeper with God

My New Year desktop image is of a sunrise peeking over the horizon. The words on the page are Happy New Year; Go deeper with God this year. I chose this image because every morning I wake and see the sunrise in a new light. This is my hope for this year, that I may see God in a new light also, instead of the same old God that I’ve spent time with in years past.

The same old God, you might ask? Sometimes we get too comfortable with our knowing God and sometimes we need to be shaken out of our comfort zone to see Him in a new light. We go through the motions day after day, read our bible in the same old way, get cozy within our skin and continue on our path of sin because, well we’re comfortable in knowing that we’ll be forgiven. 

This comfort zone should scare many. When you get too comfortable, God usually throws something out there to shake you up a bit, to wake you up and say wait a minute! I found this to be true thirteen years ago when I was too comfortable in my marriage and my relationship with God. So comfortable I allowed myself to be used and abused so much so I became a broken shard of glass seeking anything to save me and put me back together.

My family was consumed with their own lives to worry about lil ol me and God gave me the shake up of my life that would alter who I was and who I was about to become. No, God doesn’t send you a married man but he does witness a broken soul and will bring two broken souls together to become one fixable piece of artwork, His work. 

Pastor Mike said something that struck me. Someone had asked him why God protected her while not protecting others. He said, ‘because you’re a child of God, the other person had nothing to do with Him.’

When we become a child of God, we fall under the protection of a Father, a heavenly Father who will watch over us from above. Just like our dad on earth, we become too comfortable in knowing he’ll take care of us when we get in trouble but when God calls him home, we feel we’re out here on our own depending solely on God to protect us. He is our only resource.

Our mother is the nurturer while our father is the strength we turn to in our time of need. If our father has passed away, we rely on God to be our strength when we need Him. Again, we tend to get too comfortable figuring He’ll bail us out; sin or no sin, He’s got our back. 

With all of the deaths happening recently, it had me thinking, was God protecting those people from all the evil in the world and were they children of God? I don’t know, which gives rise to my second question, are they all basking in the glory of Heaven? Had they gotten so comfortable with their belief in God that they forgot to think of Him in recent months before their death?
This is why we need God daily and not just casual weekly visits to a church. This weekly visit does not absolve you of the daily need to bring Him into your day. We need to go deeper with God and that doesn’t mean memorize scripture verses, post more Godly memes or try to appear to be one with God. Going deeper with God means just that, to know Him deeply, understand His ways, live His truth and be like the Son he sent to die for you. When you get too comfortable, you begin to show signs of straying.

When I see people rambling on with hate in their mouths and conveying negative thoughts I think what that person must be suffering from. Why does he or she hold onto so much hate and ignorance while claiming to love God? I never understood the imbalance that goes on in the world and as * I * go deeper with God, I can see that even He scratches His head watching his kids destroy this beautiful creation.

Even as He placed a warm blanket of protection over me many years ago, I still fall and His fatherly strength picks me up and moves me along the way. As I shuffle forward, I realize I am going deeper with God, in meaning, in understanding, in hope and in faith. 

1 Peter 4:10, "Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms." (NIV)

Winter Peace

1 Cor. 16:6 And it may be that I will abide, yea, and winter with you, that ye may bring me on my journey whithersoever I go.

Winter Peace

A blanket of snow covers the ground

for all of the world to see.

I relish every moment

a flake falls down on me.

I see life through different eyes

while everyone is distracted.

Things slow down to a seconds pace

with many lives impacted.

The sounds are all amplified

through the overlay of snow.

Allowing you to hear the wind

breaking the trees bough.

People clothed in scarves and gloves

their boots protect their feet.

But often times people dress

for a fashionista retreat.

The multitude of masses

dress for outward show.

Would they dare robe themselves

for the God that we all know?

I don’t care for my skin to wrinkle

and wither from the sun.

I only care my actions please

the Great and Mighty One.

I’ll wear winter in my heart

All throughout the year.

And fill every single day

With the peace of Christmas cheer!

Job 13: 5 O that ye would altogether hold your peace! and it should be your wisdom.

Color me weird

Ruth 2: 10 Then she fell on her face, and bowed herself to the ground, and said unto him, Why have I found grace in thine eyes, that thou shouldest take knowledge of me, seeing I am a stranger?

When I wake in the morning and my feet touch the floor, I thank the Lord for allowing me this given day. As I saunter in to make my coffee, words of praise form in my head and I begin humming a praise tune.

When I take my dog out in the chill of the morning while the sky is alight with a full moon, I praise Him for all He has created. I see Him in the stars, the moon, the universe and thank Him for creating me.

I await my coffee to end its brewing time. I sit at my computer and begin prayers for those in need. I have never been short on prayer because each time my windowed world opens, there sits someone in need of prayer. I pray.

With a warm cup in my hands I sit and share love and praise and thank Him for placing the right people at the right time in my life. There is never a shortage of prayer needs. Even when people seem to be smiling and laughing it up, my mind hones in on them and I pray. For behind a smile is a heart; a heart that is in need of prayer as much as anyone else.

In my travels throughout the day, if someone cuts me off in traffic, I raise my hand and say, “I’ll pray for you” because I know in my heart that that person is in such a hurry and has so much on his/her mind they might forget that God is in control. They need prayer not a cursing too.

While shopping in the hustle and bustle of the season, I see people nickel-and-diming it to make ends meet and possibly trying to have a good Christmas. I pray for them while standing at the checkout. Color me weird.

People color me weird because I can’t take my eyes off of God. Sure I have bad moments, yes I hurt and get angry, I’m human but in the midst of one of those instances, God is there reassuring me that He’s got this and that I’m loved and in that moment I’m comforted.

The very essence of being a Christian is not taking your eyes off of God; even when you’re scrounging to pay the heating bill. Even when life is so hard it doesn’t have the color of richness that makes you want to go on. That is when you need God the most to carry you.

Christmas is the season where satan rears his tentacles and tries with everything he has to reach people; to make them feel unworthy, unappreciated, unloved and most of all not able to reach God. It is in these moments that God reaches in effortlessly and gets you through a season for man. Believers and unbelievers alike feel His presence. They might see it in the beauty of nature, they might feel it in a hug or warm well-wishers hand, but they FEEL God touching of them.

Pss. 44: 20 If we have forgotten the name of our God, or stretched out our hands to a strange god;

As church seats fill up during the Christmas season, more and more come to know the Glory of the Lord and for this reason God has allowed man to celebrate the birth of His Son on December 25^th. When the season ends, people go back to the same old same old pagan traditions and forget what it was that touched them during the Christmas season.

Some will cling to that feeling like a snow-blanket hugging the ground. They will rise every morning thanking Him for yet another glorious day to be alive. They will begin each day in praise and worship and end the day in prayer and thankfulness. And people everywhere will…color them weird. I bow my head and pray!

Pss.69: 8 I am become a stranger unto my brethren, and an alien unto my mother's children.

Luke 1: 64 And his mouth was opened immediately, and his tongue loosed, and he spake, and praised God.