When I was younger, I felt that there was always something missing in my life. I didn’t know what it was but I searched for it and, for many years I never found that “fulfillment” that I felt was missing. No amount of reading books or meditation or smoking “pot” or drinking could fix that empty place inside. I didn’t try all of the “things” that I could have, thankfully. But I still craved something that wasn’t there.
It’s kinda like a puzzle. When you are trying to finish a puzzle and there is a piece missing it will never be finished and whole until you find the piece that fits. God placed a desire for Himself in our souls and that is the missing piece that we feel. Yet, we walk through life looking in all sorts of places for the “something” that we feel is missing. Each of us feels that something is missing and sometimes this feeling lasts for many years until we finally feel the touch of the Holy Spirit that lets us know exactly Who is missing from our hearts.
“You, God, are my God, earnestly I seek you; I thirst for you, my whole being longs for you, in a dry and parched land where there is no water.” Psalm 63:1 (NIV)
It is God and Jesus that we are searching for. It is their influence and their Presence in our lives that we long for. Many of us live every day thinking about all sorts of problems and worries that we can do nothing about when we should hand them over to God and thank Him for taking care of them. Then, go about your normal routine like those “problems and worries” are already taken care of. This is good advice but most of us rarely follow it. We pray about our worries and then after we finish the prayer we begin to worry about the problem we just prayed about.
Many Christians, who are born-again, attempt to “help” God even though we think we are giving Him control over our lives. When you are tempted to worry about a problem, ask God to help you give it back to Him. I know this works because I have to do this multiple times a day. My Mom and grandparents were “worriers” so I acquired this habit as well but since I began reading through God’s Word every year, I have gradually come to the point of letting go. It isn’t easy but it can be done.
When you feel a problem is becoming too burdensome, begin reading and praying through Psalms. It helps with depression and pain and almost any other emotional problem that you will face. God’s grace is with you, especially when you have given your heart to Him. Seek His counsel in all things and He will comfort you in all things.
As the hart panteth after the water brooks, So panteth my soul after thee, O God. My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God: When shall I come and appear before God? My tears have been my meat day and night, While they continually say unto me, Where is thy God? When I remember these things, I pour out my soul in me: For I had gone with the multitude, I went with them to the house of God, With the voice of joy and praise, With a multitude that kept holyday. Why art thou cast down, O my soul? And why art thou disquieted in me? Hope thou in God: For I shall yet praise him For the help of his countenance. O my God, my soul is cast down within me: Therefore will I remember thee from the land of Jordan, and of the Hermonites, from the hill Mizar. Deep calleth unto deep at the noise of thy waterspouts: All thy waves and thy billows are gone over me. Yet the LORD will command his lovingkindness in the daytime, And in the night his song shall be with me, and my prayer unto the God of my life. I will say unto God my rock, why hast thou forgotten me? Why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? As with a sword in my bones, Mine enemies reproach me; While they say daily unto me, Where is thy God? Psalm 42:1-10 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/psa.42.1-10.KJV
Romans 5: 5,8:
5 And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out His love into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us. 8 But God proves His love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
God’s love for us is shown through the sacrifice of His Son for our salvation. But…God’s love also shows up in unexpected ways almost every day. Most of us don’t notice. A cool breeze on a hot day. A large cloud that shades our workplace wherever it may be. The rest we get after a long day, even if it takes a while. Finding our keys when we have lost them.
Some people may not think of these small gifts as showing the love of God, but they do. He cares for us far more than we can imagine. I believe that the fact that God loved us long before we were even born is the hardest part of His love for us to take in. He knew about each of us before Creation morning. Remember, Scripture says that God puts our sins away as far as the East is from the West. That is an infinite amount of space between Himself and any record of our sins once we have accepted Jesus and the atonement of His blood.
Jesus told His disciples to allow the children to come to Him and it is their innocence and complete faith that He desires. The problem that we have is our “grown” ideas and the fact that most of us want to help out even when we ask Him to take care of a problem. All of us want to pitch in and help but when it is cancer or something that we can’t do anything about we need to learn to depend on Him…like a child.
Even a pet or companion, like a little dog/Dachshund, depends upon us for their care, food, and well-being. We need to learn to depend on God for those things as well. We are hard-headed though and we tend toward trying to help God when He doesn’t need our “help” to take care of things.
God’s love for us, and all of His Creation, is far more intimate and deep than we can imagine. Remember, He is the One Who knitted our DNA together in the womb before we were born. He knows the kind of personality you will have and how smart you will be long before you are born. Every molecule that makes you and me who we are was designed and placed in us by Him. There is no part of you that you can keep from Him even when you want to keep something secret.
Remember, God is Life and it is by His pleasure that we live and have our being. Each breath and every heartbeat that we have is given to us by Him. That is why we need to seek Him each day before we go anywhere or even get out of bed because He provides us with the ability to talk, walk and live in His Presence every day.
God sent His Son to be the Lamb that takes the sins of the world on Himself. He did die on the cross but He rose from the dead three days later conquering death and the grave. Jesus is the embodiment of God’s love for humanity because He showed the effect of God’s love on everyone He ministered to during His three years of teaching.
So, why do we think we can’t be useful to the One Who called us to follow Him? If you have given your heart to Him and you are a born-again Christian, you were called by the Holy Spirit into His family. Your position in life or your lack of work to Him. You can be useful in His Kingdom in whatever way He has gifted you with abilities to do. Having money or a position or education doesn’t matter to Him because He equips those whom He calls. We are given gifts and abilities that only we have a real ability to use for Him.
When I titled this as “Love died on a cross”, I didn’t mean that God’s love died on that cross. I meant that the personification of His Love died on the cross. God loves us in such a way that we can’t understand it and His anger toward the people who reject Him is equally powerful but it is still tempered by His love. God can uniquely use each of us to reach people that others may not be able to reach.
God’s love is such that even if we only reach that one person, it is enough. God values each of us to the extent that your soul and mine would’ve been enough to send Jesus to Earth to die for us and save us. Even if we were the only two that were saved. It is very hard to understand compassion and love like that, in fact, we can’t understand it on this side of Heaven.
Like the story that Jesus told of the pearl that the merchant sold everything for just to acquire, a pearl of great price. Each of us is like that pearl to God our Father. We are each worth His Son’s life to gain souls and a place in Heaven. The biggest mistake that the early church made nearly two thousand years ago was using “man-made” wisdom or ideas to bring pagans into the church. Even two centuries past His crucifixion the church didn’t resemble the gatherings of believers that began the church in the late first century.
The divisions that have happened over the centuries since then show even more how easily Satan has gained a foothold in the church. There is a remnant of believers who embody the teachings of Jesus as much as possible today but it seems to be getting smaller. I pray that there will be a revival of faith in the church before He comes back. It is sorely needed today.
The Living Message of Christ 