Keep your eyes open for God

A couple of weeks ago, I got my family all up early to go to the mountains. (6:30 a.m.,on a Saturday no less!)  We left before sunrise to journey up to Rocky Mountain National Park to hear the Elk bugle.  (I had heard that the window for viewing this yearly ritual was probably almost over, so I knew it was important that we go now)  I was more excited about our adventure then my teenage son and my “acts like a teenager” 10 year old daughter, but I think we salvaged the day for them when we went out for breakfast afterward. 

After breakfast we started down the canyon.  Before we made it all the way down, we pulled off the road and took some time for some solitude.  We went our separate ways and spread out along the river bank. (The dog had to stay in the car)   I found a well placed rock to sit on down by the river and began taking in my surroundings:

The sound of the rushing river

The constant movement of the water running predictably over the rocks

The ebb and flow of the wind in the air 

The ripple of the Aspen leaves that had yet to fall from their branches 

A log cabin hidden among the trees

The wild grass and foliage at my feet

I was in a place of tranquility and peace.  A place where the cares of the world were not known.  I opened my bible and read:

“Thank God!  Pray to him by name!  Tell everyone you meet what he has done!  Sing Him songs, belt out hymns, translate his wonders into music!  Honor his holy name with Hallelujahs, you who seek God.  Live a happy life!  Keep your eyes open for God, watch for his works; be alert for signs of his presence.  Remember the world of wonders he has made, his miracles, and the verdicts he’s rendered–O seed of Abraham, his servant, O child of Jacob, his chosen.” –Psalm 105: 1-6,  The Message. 

This phrase jumped off the page at me:  

“Keep your eyes open for God, watch for his works; be alert for signs of his presence”. 

Pay attention!  God was reminding me of his constant presence.  I had sought Him out during our time of solitude and God again revealed himself as he always does.  But He was also reminding me that a serene setting by a mountain river, or a majestic vista overlooking a fertile valley aren’t necessities for finding myself in His presence.  I can experience His presence anywhere.  I imagine God gently prodding me:

“My son, pay attention, I am here, I am with you always.  Look for me in the nooks and crannies of your day.  Look for me when you are busy, look for me when you are weary.  If you’ll stay alert you will see me wherever you go, whatever your doing.  The choice is up to you though.  Thank you for looking for me today.  Now, keep your eyes open and you will see me again and again.”

God desires that we look for him throughout every moment of our lives.  In that sense he is selfish for our attention.  He wants to walk with us in the most literal sense of that phrase. 

Be alert, remain open to signs of his presence.

Dave for Wellspring copyright 2007

  

Meaningless

 

I made great works; I built houses and planted vineyards for myself; I made myself gardens and parks, and planted in them all kinds of fruit trees…

So I became great and surpassed all who were before me…

Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them…

Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had spent in doing it, and again, all was vanity and a chasing after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun…

(excerpts from Ecclesiates chapter 2)

Solomon was certainly a great man and a wise man.  He not only built a magnificent house and temple for God but acquired slaves, herds, flocks, silver, gold, treasures of kings, singers, delights of the flesh and the list goes on.  This seems to be the measure of a man, how much he has, how amazed others are at his power and wealth and the many significant accomplishments and adventures he has on his resume.  But when Solomon considered all he had done and the toil he spent doing it he saw that it was all vanity, all meaningless…a chasing after the wind.

Unfortunately there is something else that can be added to this list of things we often boast about and which we often try to find our ultimate meaning – good deeds.  We do know that faith without works is useless but do we know that works without love is equally dead?  I fear that we are creating a culture of doing church where we strive to do good, to look good, to have the right answers for every situation, to put our opponents and sinners in their place, and to show how good we’ve got it with God on our side. 

When we strive to build up our ledger of good deeds and build up a body of work we can be proud of are we falling into the trap Solomon stumbled into?  When he looked at his life under the sun he found it a chasing after the wind.  Will we have a life like Solomon’s where we have gone ahead and done what pleases ourselves or what we think pleases God and find at the end of it a great remorse for much wasted striving?  Truly our deeds are like filthy rags when you really come down to it and if we are trusting in these efforts we a very much to be pitied. 

So where does meaning come from?  How can we avoid coming to the end of our lives with a gigantic feeling of failure and looking back at hundreds of deeds with that empty feeling that they will not save?  The only way is by relationship with God.  Real meaning comes in knowing God and letting your roots grow deep through communion with Him.   Personally I am finding this well of joy and peace through surrendering to live a life of unceasing prayer.  Certainly I have miles to go in this practice but there is something about stilling my heart to listen at the feet of Jesus that changes my perspective on life.

Richard Foster writes in his book Prayer about the life in need of unceasing prayer.   He says, “I am sure you sense the desparate need for unceasing prayer in our day.  We pant through an endless series of activities with scattered minds and noisy hearts.  We feel strained, hurried, breathless.  Thoughts dart in and out of our minds with no rhyme or reason.  Seldom can we focus on a single thing for long.  Everything and anything interrupt our sense of concentration.  We are a distracted people.”  I believe Solomon became a distracted person by all the things he found to do and the enticements of life.   And I wonder if we ourselves have become distracted because we have gone on to live life without God’s input.  We have decided all we need is a few good deeds to keep the ledger in our favor, so we can get on with all our big plans for life.

I hope this doesn’t make you feel too discouraged, but the simple truth is, without prayer (communion with God) life is meaningless.   But be encouraged, a meaningful life starts with a simple prayer, a prayer that opens the door to God who is standing and knocking. 

Mary found this good thing…Jesus said to her sister “My dear Martha, you are worried and upset over all these details! There is only one thing worth being concerned about.  Mary has discovered it, and it will not be taken away from her.”  Luke 10:41-42

I hope we all find this one good thing.

Scott for Wellspring, copyright 2007

 

Honest Prayer

 

There is a significant question I must ask about prayer and you also may want to look into this matter.  When I pray and seek God, do I truly inquire of Him to listen to His voice or do I simply speak forth my desires and seek for all manner of signs to support that?  There is an interesting story on seeking God in 2 Chronicles 18.  I wonder if it speaks to the heart that seeks its own way and then looks to God for any kind of confirmation it can deduce to support its way.

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King Ahab of Israel met with King Jehoshaphat of Judah.  While in Samaria meeting together, King Ahab asked, “Will you go with me to Ramoth-gilead?”  And Jehoshaphat answered “I am with you, my people are your people.  We will be with you in the war.”

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King Jehoshaphat also said to the king of Israel, “Inquire first for the word of the Lord.”  Then the king of Israel gathered the prophets together, four hundred of them, to ask whether they should go up to battle.  The answer was a resounding yes.  “Go up; for God will give it into the hand of the king”.  Zedekiah made for himself horns of iron and said “Thus says the Lord:  With these you shall gore the Arameans until they are destroyed.”

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Jehoshaphat asked if there was another prophet and King Ahab said there was, but said to the effect, he says nothing good of me, I hate him.

Jehoshaphat insisted and an officer summoned Micaiah the prophet.  The officer relayed to Micaiah, “Look, the words of the prophets with one accord are favorable to the king;  let your word be like the word of one of them, and speak favorably.”

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So the pressure mounts for Micaiah to give a message just like the others.  Do we find ourselves in this situation also?  Yearning to please man, we give messages that tickle the ears of the hearers.

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Micaiah responds, “As the Lord lives, whatever my God says, that I will speak.” At first Micaiah responds, perhaps rather sarcastically, sure go right ahead they will be given to you, but Ahab presses further and says do not lie to me.  So he responds “I saw all Israel scattered on the mountains, like sheep without a shepherd…” Micaiah continues and speaks of a scene before the Lord…and the Lord said, “Who will entice King Ahab of Israel, so that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-gilead?”  A lying spirit comes forward and says I will entice him by being a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.  Micaiah then says to Ahab, “So you see, the Lord has put a lying spirit in the mouth of these your prophets;  the Lord has decreed disaster for you.”

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This earned a quick slap to the face for Micaiah from Zedekiah who said “Which way did the spirit of the Lord pass from me to speak to you?” 

The opportunity was there for Ahab and Jehoshaphat to turn from their plans and listen to the voice of the Lord through the one solitary prophet, Micaiah.  Yet their ears longed to hear what they had already determined as right.  They not only had their conviction of heart, but the conviction of 400 prophets who were speaking forth in “God’s name”.

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To learn to pray and seek God’s heart takes humility.  Pride says, I already know what is right, but because I am a religious person I will “seek” God on the matter.  It can be a humbling thing to be told by God you are wrong or that you are headed in the wrong path even when the majority are saying, oh, yes you are headed down the right path, continue my friend.  Why is it, sometimes that the path God has is hard and not well supported by the world of those around us?

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We must pray in the words of Psalm 139:23-24 “Search me, O God, and know my heart;  test me and know my thoughts.  See if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”  Richard Foster says in his book Prayer “If the examination is solely a self-examination, we will always end up with excessive praise or blame.  But under the search-light of the great Physician we can expect only good always.”  We must allow God to come in and search us and our motives in prayer.  We must long for His will and not ours.  We must acknowledge that we do not know everything…to tell you the truth we know very little.

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As time goes by I am wondering if one of the model prayers for me is this from Jehoshaphat, “…We do not know what to do, but we are looking to You for help.”  2 Chronicles 20:12b

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Lately I find myself praying, “I do not know what to do.  I do not know what is right.”  Sometimes it feels like I am paddling into a thick fog.  And this leaves me with one thing to truly follow with, “God I look to you for help.”  I think this is the start to honest prayer.

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Scott for Wellspring Copyright 2007