PRACTICING THE PRESENCE OF THE LORD
Psalms 46:10,11 “Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.” The Lord Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.
Have you ever noticed how hard it is sometimes to just be still? Our worship pastor Lance Van Tine wrote a song called, “Just be silent. Just be still.” It is purposely sang slow that almost forces us to slow our mind down from all the high speed life and sometimes worship, to focus on the Lord in not just the music, but our mind, heart and soul. It always draws us into a more deeper intimate fellowship with Jesus.
Here in the United States we live a hectic life. Even when we have a chance to slow down, our minds are constantly active. If we aren’t watching TV, we are doing something on the computer or cell phone. We even eat fast and usually with the evening news going on at the same time. We have somewhat lost the ability to talk and fellowship with each other let alone with Jesus. Oh, we have our pray time, but even with that we tend to fly through it without much of a thought of what we have just said. The real fellowship of really listening and caring what is being said seems at times to be a lost art. We hears words, but all the time we are thinking what we want to say next. The side part is with electronic communication we don’t even have to bother to listen. We scan and delete or even unfriend!
Sad to say we tend to carry this into the spiritual areas of our life as well, and it is not just with listening to our pastor on Sunday. Spiritual fellowship with brothers and sisters in Christ is almost unheard of anymore. When we do get together we find our fellowship very superficial and to the point, usually about the things of this world. We hardly even know the people we plan we will spend eternity with. We wave, say good morning or have a good week and jump in the car. Even worse is how we treat our fellowship with our Heavenly Father, the Holy Spirit and Jesus. As a rule we all need to do much better. We can’t afford to treat them like the elderly placed in a nursing home and for the most part forgotten. We can not let life get too busy to have daily intimate fellowship with them.
How do we do this? Well, it is a whole lot easier than we might think. All we have to do is make an effort to remember there are with us every minute of the day. We can comment to them about anything from the song we are just hearing, to the checkout lady at WalMart that had a sweet kind smile. We can thank them and praise them and enjoy them all day long! It is amazing how this affects our day. We become much more positive, relaxed, happy and even thoughtful. So, if this is the case, then why don’t we do it all the time. The answer is simple. It is not a priority for us! But we can make it our priority! We don’t have to say goodbye to the Lord when we walk out of the house, and yell back at our family, “Have a good day see you tonight.” We can just remind them to remember Jesus is with them, and then remind yourself too. What a gift we have given them, and ourselves too!
Prayer: Heavenly Father, Holy Spirit and Jesus, thank you for wanting to be with us. Please help us to always practice your presence every minute of every day. You are too wonderful to let a day or minute go by without you. We love you Lord!
