Understanding God

It seems that all anyone ever wants is to be able to understand God, and though we can never fully understand Him, there are ways to understand Him more than we do right now.

Proverbs 2:1-6 says

"My son, if you accept my words and store up my commands within you, listening closely to wisdom and directing your heart to understanding; furthermore, if you call out to insight

and lift your voice to understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for it like hidden treasure, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and discover the knowledge of God. For the Lord gives wisdom; from His mouth come knowledge and understanding."

Often we want to try and understand God because we want to know the "why?" of a situation. But, if that is the only reason we have for wanting to understand God, then in a way, aren't we just using Him? Using Him, so that we can know more for ourselves. Why don't we try to understand Him, simply because we want to know Him better? So that we can have a better, clearer, more intimate, and stronger relationship with Him. So before we even try to understand God, let's figure out why?

Once you know why you want to understand Him, do exactly what Proverbs 2:1-6 says. Accept His words, store His commands inside of you, listen closely. It says that if you yearn for it like silver and hidden treasure, then you will understand Him. It all goes back to the whole reason we were even created, to have a relationship with Him. 1 John 3:1 says; "See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called His children." and Leviticus 26:12 "I will walk among you and be your God, and you will be My people.". All He's ever wanted out of us is a relationship. He wants you to understand Him, He doesn't try to hide it from you. 1 John 5:14 says "And we are confident that he hears us whenever we ask for anything that pleases him."

Similar to other relationships, you get out of it what you put into it. So, if you are really serious about having a stronger understanding of God, then you need to get with Him daily. You need to have a strong bond with Him. It isn't as hard as it may sound. Yes, sometimes it can be hard, but if you really stay devoted to it you'll begin to want to. The best parts of my day are when I can souly be with Him. If you don't know where to begin I would suggest first reading Proverbs, it isn't that long and it's all about learning who God is and how to understand Him more. (It isn't that long, 31 Chapters that mostly aren't even a page long, read one a day if you want and you'll have read all of Proverbs in a month!) Another thing that I really suggest you do, is what I have been doing, asking Him to reveal a new part of Himself to you every day (Do it when you get up!).

When God reveals Himself to you it's one more thing you can begin to understand about Him!

He knows you, even when you fall

"You have searched me, Lord and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar." 

Psalms 139:1-2

 Take a moment to think of the person who knows you the absolute most out of anyone else. They know things about you that you don't even like about yourself, but they for some reason still love you despite that. But, do they know every single one of your thoughts? What if they did, would they still even like you, let alone love you? Maybe, maybe not, I don't know for sure but I'll take a guess that it would be a no. But, God does know, and still loves you....As cookie cutter of an answer it is, from the worship song You know me by Bethel "And nothing is hidden from Your sight Wherever I go, You find me And You know every detail of my life And You are God and You don't miss a thing" Often many will try to run from God in times that they feel ashamed and guilty. Yet when we run away and try to hide, we are left empty.

For King David, the guilt was great. This beloved king lost his honor after committing acts of adultery, and then committing murder to cover it all up. (You can read 2 Samuel 11 and 12 if you want to read more into exactly what he did.) It's human nature to hide from guilt, that was David's course of action. After nearly a year of covering it up, David was tired of running from the truth, and from God. In Psalm 51:4 David cries out "Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgement." 

After being guilty of two capital offenses under the Jewish law, there was still mercy for this repentant king. Though there were consequences for David's actions, there was grace to follow. David's pure heart of confession led to restoration of his honor in Israel. Following this he wrote Psalm 32

"Blessed is the one
whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered.
Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord does not count against them
and in whose spirit is no deceit.
When I kept silent, my bones wasted away
through my groaning all day long.
For day and night your hand was heavy on me;
my strength was sapped
as in the heat of summer.
Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity.
I said, “I will confess
my transgressions to the Lord.”
And you forgave
the guilt of my sin.
Therefore let all the faithful pray to you while you may be found;
surely the rising of the mighty waters
will not reach them.
You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble
and surround me with songs of deliverance.
I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you.
Do not be like the horse or the mule, which have no understanding
but must be controlled by bit and bridle
or they will not come to you. Many are the woes of the wicked,
but the Lord’s unfailing love
surrounds the one who trusts in him. Rejoice in the Lord and be glad, you righteous; sing, all you who are upright in heart!"

We know our sin will never fully satisfy us. Isaiah touches on this well. “But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear” (59:2). Our sin separates us from the Love of Christ. We are ashamed when we sin and turn our face even more from God to try and hide even more. BUT, when we follow Jesus with our whole being, we are forgiven of our ways, we are made clean. The chorus in We Will Run by Gungor is "We will run to you, we will run to you. Turning from our sin, we return to You. Father heal your world, make all things new. Oh bring us back to You."  After we realize our sin is never fulfilling and we turn back to God. He welcomes us back Home, like the Prodigal son. With open arms He holds us in comfort and love. 

This all leads me to my main thought. That He really does know you. As much as it is said, it's said so often because of how true it really is. You can never upset God, He will never be mad at you. He has already expected you with all of your screw ups in mind. As much shame as you may feel for whatever you have done, God has already forgiven it. It's like when you get in an argument with your best friend and you don't even want to really deal with it, you just want to move on and go back to how everything was before the issue. The same thing is with God, just have a pure heart and He'll forgive you. He just wants to continue that relationship with you that you've had.
 I want you to take a minute and try to think of someone God hasn't forgiven. Just take a minute and think. Could you? I highly doubt you could. God isn't unforgiving. He is the most forgiving out of ALL. He will never hold a grudge, He will never stop pursing you when you run, He will never stop loving you when you stop loving Him. 

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVVlMQved8k

Heart Check over a Sound Check

We can often spend so much time and effort to make sure that the 'sound' is right . But in reality, the 'sound' could sound beyond perfect and it wouldn't really matter at all. From God its pretty much something like 'Thanks for the effort, but I don't want that, it's for show and not for me'. God doesn't want fake and He doesn't want our worship to be perfect how we may sometimes think perfect is. Perfect 'sound' to Him is our real and raw self, the un-glamorized, dirty, self abandoned, and the worst part of yourself that we don't want others to see. To God, when all of those things are displayed on that 'stage', THAT is what perfect worship is to Him, because it's real.

Now, God doesn't expect you to look perfect. Jesus never chose the perfect looking ones. His disciples were fisherman and tax collectors, the lowest of the low. His mother was just a girl, and His father, a carpenter. Jesus healed the crippled and blind, spoke with women that were cast away by society. He never spent His time in a some palace, BY CHOICE.

The parts that you hate about yourself, He loves, because it's real. God doesn't want us to try and appear perfect. The way I really see it is, if we're suppose to be like and resemble Christ, why do we try to look and sound perfect on that 'stage' sometimes? He never put Himself above the ones around Him.

STOP.

If we all just stopped, closed our eyes, and focused souly on God for even only minutes, setting aside everything that's going on, our lives would be so much less stressful. We always talk about how stressed we are and all the problems in our lives, but what if we were focused on more than that? A few months back at my youth group, my pastor asked us all to close our eyes, clear out all the problems and stress, and to souly focus on God. During those few minutes, some saw visions, pictures, words, etc. but for me I didn't see anything, it was more what I felt. I felt weightless, calm, safe, happy, and at peace. To think that in just those mere minutes I had felt more at peace and close to God then I had in a while. I wanted to write on this not to say that you need to be in the still quiet to be at peace and close to God, because you don't. I wrote this as a reminder that God wants you to have that, that time where you aren't worrying and stressing, but are instead with Him. After that night I felt refreshed. If we all took more moments in our lives to stop everything we are doing, sit down and close our eyes, and focus on Him we would be much less stressed and worried. God is all about being refreshed and renewed in Him; Psalm 23:3 says "He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake." ; Jeremiah 29:14 says "I will be found by you, declares the Lord, and I will restore you.."; 1 Peter 5:10 says "And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast." I like that last one in 1 Peter especially, it shows that God knows the pain we often go through and He understands it but He promises that even through that He will restore you. I encourage you to take more moments to just STOP. Starting now...go