18 Aug Passionate Pursuit!
Blog entry by Herb Marks
Here is an amazing invitation! Try wrapping your mind around it. Engaging its promise will change you.
“Call to me and I will answer you and show you great and mighty things, fenced in and hidden, which you do not know — do not distinguish and recognize, have knowledge of and understand.” (Jeremiah 33:3 Amplified Bible)
My son, Deryck, and I went go-carting. You have a seat, steering wheel, four miniature wheels and a lawnmower engine — on steroids! We went fast! I thought I had turned pro in no time, sliding around the corners with the wind in my face. Until, that is, the really good guys passed me up. These guys were passionately pursuing speed! I tried everything in my short experience to catch them. They left me humbled in their dust and exhaust. I was reminded that passionate pursuit occurs because of consistent effort, patience and never giving up.
When the scripture reads, “Call to me,” it is not a single or a once-in-a-while pursuit. It is pursuit until He speaks. Our Father deeply enjoys our pursuing Him. And notice this! The scripture becomes more meaningful to us because He promises to answer if we call. God cannot lie nor fail. He longs to answer our call. His delay in answering prepares our hearts to listen, receive and carry out what He tells us to do.
The “dust and exhaust” of our pursuit of God disillusions many people. A half-hearted effort reveals our condition of anemic faith and trust. The end result is shallowness that dulls the warning siren of the Holy Spirit. He cries out for us to shake off this satisfaction of merely existing without hearing His voice and feeling His breath on our souls.
When God speaks to our inner hearts, we have to respond. Often, we are surprised to learn that our condition before God is lethargic obedience. We don’t want to give ourselves permission to pursue God with abandonment. Putting it simply, we don’t want to obey. Our obedience is a measurement of our intimate relationship to God.
Lord, awaken our hearts to love you with obedience, because you long to show great and mighty things we do not know.
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