Thursday 28 June 2012

July 2012 - Impressing God


It sometimes amazes me as to what people want to impress others with.  Sometimes people lay on the big words, big ideas and big knowledge trying to impress with intellect.  Sometimes it’s the attempt to impress with success through speaking about wealth or position.  Sometimes its gifts and talents as they seek approval from their abilities.  While these are all good when taken in a proper perspective, there is something that does have a significant impression on me.  I’m sensitive to it because I believe God is also sensitive to it.  This really impresses God.

I bring this up as a counterbalance to my last pondering.  While intellect is important, we should not hold that it is the most important.  There is a trap in thinking.  Paul wrote that knowledge puffs up (1 Cor. 8:1).  I admit that there have been times where my theology (knowledge of God) has tripped me up from really knowing Him or receiving from Him.  I am not encouraging the throwing off of all we know of God but to recognize that we know and see in part (1 Cor. 13:12).  I am also pointing to something beyond knowledge that God is impressed with.

What impresses God and me is what is seen in the heart, not the head.  Knowledge is easily added to but the training of a heart is a much deeper work.  Consider God’s own words concerning the importance of heart tuning:
  • The Lord has sought for Himself a man after His own heart ... (1 Sam. 13:14)
  • But the Lord said to Samuel, "Do not look at his appearance or his physical stature, because I have refused him. For the Lord does not see as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." (1 Sam. 16:7)
  • For the eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His. (2 Chron. 16:9)
Whether you look at Abraham, Moses, David, Jeremiah, Peter or Paul, you will see God responding to their hearts.  They all had their flaws and made big mistakes but God saw something in them that caused Him to strongly support them anyway.

I am not discounting or diminishing the need for repentance in our lives – the changing of thought and action.  However, if you change thought and action without having a heart that supports it, then it will be short-lived and shallow.  Paul wrote that godly sorrow leads us to repentance – a heart issue (2 Cor. 7:9-11).  The elders have been sensing this sorrow in their prayer times.  God is bringing us to a place of influence with Him like never before by taking us to the place where our hearts are completely His.  From that place of influence, we will have the impact He desires in the world.  I encourage you to go to the places of the heart that God is dealing with today.  These are often deep places of brokenness that God needs to bring wholeness to.  The changes that are coming our way will require it but the rewards will be well worth it.

Journeying with you,   Pastor Merril