Presence of God
A very good Pastor, friend of ours, left with us these beautiful words of wisdom during a special occasion when we celebrated multiple blessings of birthdays in the family as well as blessing of a new home: he said, paraphrased, “During our special celebrations and in our daily lives, the most important thing we should seek for, we should pray for and be thankful for is God’s presence.” That made a very profound impact on me as I am guilty of presuming that God is always present with me and that I haven’t really paid particular attention on the so many ways He had made His presence felt in my life and in the lives of others around me.
With that, I made a resolve to be intentional on experiencing His wonderful presence everyday in so many different ways and truly savor the joy that comes with it. I thought of the times when God revealed His presence to us when we gather with our family at the start of the day or at the end of it. Have I thanked him enough? For being with our family in their workplaces, in their school, in their drive to where they’ve gone for the day, in their homes, did I remember Him?
Did I truly enjoy His presence when we congregate with our family and friends at church? We are so immersed with the programs and activities we need to do or the friends we need to connect with but have we really connected with God in the midst of this all?
When we take our “alone” time with God and quietly reach out to Him in prayer, or when teaching a class, or attending an office meeting, do we sense Him there?
Although we don’t literally see Him face-to-face, I believe we can experience His “faces” wherever we are, whatever we do, or whatever time of the day, when we believe He is there.
Jeremiah 29:13 says, “ And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.”
With all our heart…perhaps I didn’t give it my ALL. When you and I search Him with all our hearts even in unexpected places, or from people we don’t know like hearing the kind words of a little boy to His Mom, or the special hymns played by a strange man at the subway station – those things that put a smile on our faces even though we are exhausted after a day’s work, things that clear our minds from the stress of job-searching, things that make us forget ourselves and allow our thoughts to focus on God – then we find Him there and JOY fill us like we’ve never felt before.
God wants us to encounter, experience and live the joy that He has planned for each of us. We have allowed the things and cares of this world to weigh us down and so we become insensitive to God’s “faces”, we become spiritually blind and deaf as well. The still small voice of the Holy Spirit has been drowned by the noise of our selfish longings, and so we distance ourselves from Him.
Lord, thank you for the “sweet gift” of Your Presence. We pray that we live each day experiencing your presence and the assurance of the joy of being always with you.
#God’spresence #inspiration #livingjoy #seasonofjoy