Category Archives: Spiritual hunger

The Hungry Heart

The opportunity of worship is the opportunity to gaze on the power and beauty of the Lord. Coming into worship in a church isn’t about the “entertainment” value. It is the incredible opportunity to come face to face with the living God.

Yes, I’ve seen you in the sanctuary;
I’ve seen your power and glory. (Psalm 63:2, CEB)

David would come into the sanctuary and allow the elements of worship draw him into the presence of God. Worship together needs to draw our attention to the One worthy of worship. It is about the Lamb on the throne. It is not about US. David would come into the sanctuary and find the elements of the liturgy drawing him to seek the Lord. It was in that worship he found the power and the glory of God.

Come hungry! When you come to church, come ready to feast!

Too often we come exhausted. We drop into our seats and hope that the worship team has something for us. It may just shock our entire system to think WE are supposed to come in with hearts hungry and asking, “Lord, what can I do for you?”

When you come to worship with the Body of Christ, begin with an appetizer at home. Feast on the Word. Read a Psalm or two. Take the time to put on some worship music that begins to draw your heart to the worship of the Lamb on the throne. Have those songs in your heart on the way to church. When the Israelites came to the Feasts, they would sing the “Songs of Ascents.” They came worshipping.

As you come in tasting the Word of God and preparing your heart with song, you may find that you can more readily experience the power and the glory of God when you are there.

As a pastor, and along with our worship team, we want our hearts hungry when we come as well. I have feasted on the Word all week as I try to prepare a great meal for those coming to church. I have asked for a song in my heart. I don’t always come with a song… but I try.

The realization is that neither I nor the worship team can put that song into the hearts of those coming. We can only supplement that song. I’m long done with the guilt that I’m supposed to “crank it up” for those coming. No show. We’re hungry hearts coming to feast on the greatness of our God. And with hungry hearts we will see his power and glory.

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The EXPERIENCE of God

Scripture invites us to the experience of God.

Psalm 34:8 — Taste and see how good the Lord is!

Psalm 45:8 — All your clothes have the pleasing scent of myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.

John 10:27 — My sheep listen to my voice. I know them and they follow me.

Psalm 63:2 —
Yes, I’ve seen you in the sanctuary;
I’ve seen your power and glory.

(All Common English Bible)

God is beyond the mind. He is beyond the propositional truth. He is the God who wants us to know him.

The Holy Spirit doesn’t make us alive for the purpose of having our brains know some truth alone. The Spirit makes us alive for pursuit. The God of all might and power has apprehended us! We are called to a holy pursuit.

We are so numb to experience. We seem to be locked up in the fantasy world of just “knowing” the right stuff.

A spiritual kingdom lies all about us, enclosing us, embracing us, altogether within reach of our inner selves, waiting for us to recognize it. God Himself is here waiting our response to His presence. This eternal wold will come alive to us the moment we begin to reckon upon its reality. (Tozer, The Pursuit of God)

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Clinging

8 My whole being clings to you;
your strong hand upholds me. (Psalm 63:8, CEB)

We are so self-sufficient. Our rugged individualism sets our course. We don’t want room for errors. We certainly don’t want room for failures.

We need a faith beyond what we can plan! We need a faith that tenaciously clings to the Savior. We need to go out past the safe harbor and throw ourselves into the open waters, trusting the wind of the Spirit to carry us.

Fire in Our Bones

19 Brothers and sisters, we have confidence that we can enter the holy of holies by means of Jesus’ blood, 20 through a new and living way that he opened up for us through the curtain, which is his body, 21 and we have a great high priest over God’s house.

22 Therefore, let’s draw near with a genuine heart with the certainty that our faith gives us, since our hearts are sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies are washed with pure water. (Heb. 10:19-22, CEB)

We have become too easily satisfied. We have settled into propositional truths and contented ourselves with intellectual ascent to being “in Christ.” It has come to a point, it seems, where we care very little about missing something on the personal level of experience.

The instant cure of most of our religious ills would be to enter the Presence in spiritual experience, to become suddenly aware that we are in God and that God is in us. (Tozer, The Pursuit of God)

The great adventure of knowing God is the greatest invitation we have. It is the opportunity to lift ourselves out of our narrow thinking and put us in a place where our hearts can be enlarged by his presence. We need this call shouting in our inner most being: “BOLDLY go into that holy presence!”

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At the End of Ourselves

2 God said, “Take your son, your only son whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah. Offer him up as an entirely burned offering there on one of the mountains that I will show you.” 3 Abraham got up early in the morning, harnessed his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, together with his son Isaac. He split the wood for the entirely burned offering, set out, and went to the place God had described to him. (Gen. 22:2-3, CEB)

God takes Abraham to the very edge. He puts Abraham in a place of no retreat. The knife is up in the air then God stops him. Abraham gets to the place of possessing nothing… yet having everything.

“Now he was a man wholly surrendered, a man utterly obedient, a man who possessed nothing.” (A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God)

Repenting of Sin? Or Sorry You Got Caught?

To fear the Lord is to hate evil.
I hate pride and arrogance,
the path of evil and corrupt speech. (Prov. 8:13, CEB)

“Lukewarm people don’t really want to be saved from their sin; they want only to be saved from the penalty of their sin. They don’t genuinely hate sin and aren’t truly sorry for it; they’re merely sorry because God is going to punish them.”
– Francis Chan, Crazy Love

As one cartoon I once saw said, “I haven’t really died to sin, but I did feel faint once.”

God Waits to be Wanted

15 Moses replied, “If you won’t go yourself, don’t make us leave here. 16 Because how will anyone know that we have your special approval, both I and your people, unless you go with us? Only that distinguishes us, me and your people, from every other people on the earth.”

17 The Lord said to Moses, “I’ll do exactly what you’ve asked because you have my special approval, and I know you by name.”

18 Moses said, “Please show me your glorious presence.” (Ex. 33:15-18, CEB)

A.W. Tozer:

Complacency is a deadly foe of all spiritual growth. Acute desire must be present or there will be no manifestation of Christ to His people. He waits to be wanted.  (The Pursuit of God)

Something needs to cry out in us that Jesus is worth pursuing! There is a thirst that needs to rise up in us. Moses had that thirst. He was not going to move in any direction until God promised his presence. He then boldly moves into another level of seeking. He blurts out, “Show me your glory!”

This isn’t about “earning” anything. It is about desire. Moses desired. God didn’t berate him and say, “Hey! You have enough already!”

God showed Moses all he could. Moses asked.

God waits to be wanted.

Thirst For God

Just like a deer that craves streams of water,
my whole being craves you, God.
2 My whole being thirsts for God, for the living God.
When will I come and see God’s face?
 (Psalm 42:1-2, CEB)

A.W. Tozer’s great book, The Pursuit of God, was one of the first Christian classics I was introduced to in college. The past few weeks I have been on a quest. I want my tastes changed for the Kingdom of God. I want to THIRST again.

Tozer:
The whole transaction of religious conversion has been made mechanical and spiritless. Faith may now be exercised without a jar to the moral life and without embarrassment to the Adamic ego. Christ may be ‘received’ without creating any special love for Him in the soul of the receiver. A man is ‘saved,’ but he is not hungry nor thirsty after God. In fact, he is specifically taught to be satisfied and is encouraged to be content with little.

I can understand being content with “little” in this world. This world just can’t satisfy. But to be content with “little” from God is just crazy. Yet, that has been my life. I need a new thirst.

What is the Song God Sings Over You?

7 You are my secret hideout!
You protect me from trouble.
You surround me with songs of rescue! Selah (Psalm 32:7, CEB)

17 The Lord your God is in your midst—a warrior bringing victory.
He will create calm with his love;
he will rejoice over you with singing. (Zeph. 3:17, CEB)

Propositional truth is good. It is necessary. We need to understand what God has done for us and what we can do in return.

But the songs of love are good as well. THEY are necessary. We get our heads exploding with knowledge. Sometimes we just need our souls to sing. And sometimes we need to get quiet and hear our God sing over us.

Listen for his song!

Doing Better in Adversity

I was thinking about the Western Civilization class I am finishing up (as a teacher) this semester. Reflecting on the 60s and a movement started by a generation that had not known hardship or war, there were some things that reflect well on that generation. Civil rights is at the top of the list. (I would argue THEY didn’t get that battle won, but they were there to raise a lot of awareness.) But there were things that went terribly wrong as well. It was like they had to create their own adversity in some ways.

The 1920s and the 1960s were probably generations that had so much given to them… and then squandered. I may be a part of a generation in much the same mold.

I then think of a generation molded by adversity. A generation hit by economic depression and war. THAT is a generation that knew adversity and was strengthened.

We don’t do well when we are handed ease. We don’t like adversity, but truth be told, we are better FOR adversity in our lives than without it.

As Christians, it is much the same. Adversity tests the mettle of our faith. We have the precious metal forged in us. We don’t like it. Who does? But adversity is a far better gauge of genuine strength than ease.