James 4:8-10 Holman Christian Standard Bible
8 Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, sinners, and purify your hearts, double-minded people! 9 Be miserable and mourn and weep. Your laughter must change to mourning and your joy to sorrow. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you.
The Word of God for the Children of God.
Glory be to the Father,
and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen, amen.
The Advent and Christmas seasons are a powerful and unique time of year to remember that Jesus came from eternity to make a way for us to be near God.
In his life, death, and resurrection, Jesus built a bridge between us and God allowing us to have continual, unhindered communion with our Creator.
But God can’t force us into nearness with him.
Even as believers filled with the Holy Spirit, we can choose to live as if God is still far off.
So this Advent, Christmas season, may we choose to open our hearts to the living God that we might experience fullness of joy in his loving presence.
Except, what do we do when we cannot find God?
The Christian author C. S. Lewis searched for God during the illness of his wife without finding him.
In his book A Grief Observed, Lewis wrote, “Meanwhile, where is God? … Go to him when your need is desperate … and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolting and double-bolting on the inside. After that, silence. You may as well turn away.”
Both believers and non believers, sceptics and agnostics and atheist’s have searched for God without being able to find him.
David, who wrote of the wonderful comfort of God in Psalm 23, also cried out in Psalm 22:1, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
Jesus said those self same words on the cross (Matthew 27:46).
If for some reason you can’t seem to find God, or identify with the voice of God calling them as Eli and Samuel, let God know you can’t find Him—then listen.
Listen longer, Listen harder, Listen hardcore, Listen continually, continuously, Listen repeatedly, Listen as if your very eternity (because it is) is at highest risk.
Psalm 139:23-24 Holman Christian Standard Bible
23 Search me, God, and know my heart;
test me and know my concerns.
24 See if there is any offensive[a] way in me;
lead me in the everlasting way.
God is right where He always is.
The writer C.S. Lewis found that perhaps the volume of his own cries deafened him “to the [still small] voice [he] hoped to hear.”
He wrote later, “I have gradually been coming to feel that the door is no longer shut and bolted. Was it my own frantic need that slammed it in my face?”
Accept God’s invitation: “Come near to God and God will come near to you.”
Come as you are, empty handed, and with a simple prayer.
God is where we are.
Says Jesus in John 6:37, “Whoever comes to me I will never drive away.”
It’s a sure promise.
Try Identifying The Importance of Our Drawing Near
James 4:7-10 Easy-to-Read Version
7 So give yourselves to God. Stand against the devil, and he will run away from you. 8 Come near to God and he will come near to you. You are sinners, so clean sin out of your lives.[a] You are trying to follow God and the world at the same time. Make your thinking pure. 9 Be sad, be sorry, and cry! Change your laughter into crying. Change your joy into sadness. 10 Be humble before the Lord, and he will make you great.
James 4:8 contains a profound promise of God.
Scripture says, “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.”
For a while I thought this verse seemed backwards.
Does not God do the drawing?
Is not God the one who’s constantly pursuing us?
After diving deeper into the meaning of James 4:8 I discovered an important truth that’s foundational to living in communion with God: the door of God’s heart is always open to us, His love is always for us, presence always available.
At Calvary, The Father turned away from Jesus as ours sins rested squarely on His Son’s shoulders ensuring He would never ever have to turn away from us.
To draw near to God is to simply open our hearts to what was always available.
It’s not that God ever withholds his presence from us.
It’s that He never forces us to abide in Him.
If all us sheep want to go our own way, He willingly and patiently waits for us.
And the moment that we turn our hearts back to him, He is there to fill us with a grand celebration, revelation, of His loving nearness and unwavering devotion.
Luke 15:17-24 GOD’S WORD Translation
17 “Finally, he came to his senses. He said, ‘How many of my father’s hired men have more food than they can eat, while I’m starving to death here? 18 I’ll go at once to my father, and I’ll say to him, “Father, I’ve sinned against heaven and you. 19 I don’t deserve to be called your son anymore. Make me one of your hired men.” ’
20 “So he went at once to his father. While he was still at a distance, his father saw him and felt sorry for him. He ran to his son, put his arms around him, and kissed him. 21 Then his son said to him, ‘Father, I’ve sinned against heaven and you. I don’t deserve to be called your son anymore.’ [a]
22 “The father said to his servants, ‘Hurry! Bring out the best robe, and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. 23 Bring the fattened calf, kill it, and let’s celebrate with a feast. 24 My son was dead and has come back to life. He was lost but has been found.’ Then they began to celebrate.
In his book, The Pursuit of God, A. W. Tozer describes two veils.
The first veil was the veil between the Holy of Holies and the world was torn at the death of Jesus, signifying the availability of God’s manifest presence to all.
The second veil is the veil of our own hearts, our decision to tear by God’s grace.
Whether it’s the effects of sin and shame or a lack of understanding what’s available to us in Christ, all of us have the ability to veil places in our hearts.
Like the Prodigal son while wildly spending our inheritance, all of us can shield our beliefs about our identity, our possessions, or all our relationships from the abiding presence of Jesus and live to live far apart from communion with Him.
We all have the ability at any given moment to go our own way and miss out on abundant life.
Isaiah 53:6 GOD’S WORD Translation
6 We have all strayed like sheep.
Each one of us has turned to go his own way,
and the Lord has laid all our sins on him.
But the truth is that the Christian life is not about our ability to abide in God perfectly, but about God’s grace to draw near to us in response to repentance.
Reading Scripture, God has no expectation that we would live this life perfectly.
He remembers our frame and knows we are dust (Psalm 103:14).
What God desires from us is to allow the Holy Spirit to illuminate any parts of our lives that are not His that we would be quick to repent, return to our right minds, renewing our worship, and enjoy his grace-filled presence once again.
God is not angry with us for veiling your heart.
He knows better than we do the reasons we are not letting him fully in.
His heart is filled with the fullness of compassion for us that we might all live to experience the fullness of His grace rather than strive, condemn ourselves for all of our bodily and sinful, spiritual failures and unchangeable imperfections.
While we wait for His Advent, our Christmas gifts, why not take some brief time today to rend apart the veil of your own heart, draw near to God, and experience the abundance of His glory, the nearness of His breath, His manifest presence.
In the name of God, the Father and God the Son and God the Holy Spirit,
Guided Prayer:
1. Meditate on God’s promise to draw near to you if you will draw near to him. Allow the truth of God’s word to fill you with faith to encounter God.
“Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.” James 4:8
“You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.” Jeremiah 29:13
2. What parts of your heart seem veiled today?
Where are you going your own way?
Where in your life are you not experiencing abundant life in God synonymous with communion with him?
3. Rend the veil over your own heart today and allow God to flood those places with his forgiveness and grace.
Take time to allow him to fill you with a revelation of his love.
Psalm 139:23-24 The Message
23-24 Investigate my life, O God,
find out everything about me;
Cross-examine and test me,
get a clear picture of what I’m about;
See for yourself whether I’ve done anything wrong—
then guide me on the road to eternal life.
“We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.” Hebrews 6:19-20
May Hebrews 10:19-22 provide joy and hope to your heart as you seek to draw near to your heavenly Father:
Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.
Lord our God, show us your presence in our lives. Help us to trust that you will never let go of us. As you have promised, you will never forsake us. In Jesus name, Amen.
Glory be to the Father,
and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost;
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be,
world without end. Amen, amen.
Loving God, Living God, Loving Hope, Living Hope, Loving Living Life His Way! "Many things are possible for the person who has hope. Even more is possible for the person who has faith. And still more is possible for the person who knows how to love. But everything is possible for the person who practices all three virtues." - Brother Lawrence (1605-1691), Practicing the Presence of God (1692). 