A Passion for His Presence

Have you ever realized that we serve a God whose presence is always near to us? A God who is familiar with every thought and feeling we encounter, and a God who, "considers everything we do?" (Psalm 33:13-15). What excitement we find when we realize that He is indeed our Emmanuel...our God with us! It is etched within His character and defined by His Name. He is our always present Lord!

God's Word is filled with verses about God's presence and the extent of His knowledge regarding His children. Psalm 139 says He knows when you sit down and when you rise, your going out and your lying down, your thoughts, and a word before you speak it ( that can be scary :). It says He is " familiar with ALL of your ways!" Now that is something to rejoice about! You serve a God who knows you perfectly and watches over you so closely that He knows when you sit down and when you stand up! Joshua 1:9 says, "...do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go."

The Lord also reveals to us His ever-present nature through His very Name. He is Emmanuel... " Our God is with us. He is El Roi- " The God who sees. He is Jehovah Shammah- "The Lord is there." He is Jehovah Jireh, our provider. THis is interesting; Jireh literally means "to see" So God sees our needs before we are even aware of them and provides for them more perfectly that we could ever imagine! Proverbs 15:3 says, " The eyes of the LORD are in every place, watching the evil and the good." Our Jesus Himself left this earth by saying, "...And surely I am with you ALWAYS, to the very end of the age" (Matthew 28:20).

So how should we respond to this? The only word to describe our response is transformation! When we realize that the presence of the Lord Jesus is with us EVERY moment of our existence, it should CHANGE OUR LIVES! Before we say that quick angry word at a person, remember that He already knows it and is standing right before you. He is always standing right before us: While we're with our friends, while we're alone, while we're with our boyfriends. Would we do or say some of the things we do it we could see the Lord Jesus physically standing before us? Think about it for a minute...because He is that present in our lives. 

Should it not also change the way we pray when we truely realize that our Lord and our Creator is listening to our every word? Job 7:17-18 says, "What is man, that You make so much of Him...that you visit him every morning and test him every moment?" What if we stopped thinking of our quiet times as something to "check off the list of things a good Christian girl does every day" and started truly realizing that we are MEETING WITH JESUS? The same Jesus who was able to heal every disease brought before Him, spiritual or physical, and look straight into the very hearts of those He created and love them perfectly. This is the same Jesus I talk to today. A " visit" from Him every morning as Job put it! May others day the same about us as they did Peter and John- "... they took note that they had been with Jesus" (Acts 4:13). 

So let's pray and ask Him to remind us that He is in our midst and ask Him to change our lives by giving us a passion for His presence!