December 20, 2024
This includes you who were once far away from God. You were his enemies, separated from him by your evil thoughts and actions. Yet now he has reconciled you to himself through the death of Christ in his physical body. As a result, he has brought you into his own presence, and you are holy and blameless as you stand before him without a single fault. (Colossians 1:21-22, NLT)
Our greatest problem is not the economy, the culture, or the world we live in. Our most debilitating issue from which all other problems derive is our separation from God. We have lost the one thing that makes us work, that makes us whole and right. That gives us direction, power, and life. That puts our lives in order. We have lost God's near presence.
THE FIRST ADAM
We were born separated from the One who made us. This began in the Garden when our First Parents chose to disobey their Creator. The result was the great separation (orchestrated by Satan, who knew that we were only a threat to him when we were walking in intimacy with God.) They were cast from the Garden, where they had walked 24/7 in perfect union with the Father.
THE SECOND ADAM
But even as they were banished from God’s presence (the greatest loss), God knew what was coming. He would one day send His Son, the Adam of a new Kingdom to do for us what we could not do for ourselves. He was born into this earth as a man, lived and died, and rose again to pay the penalty for our sins so that we could be reconciled back to God. All those who humbly come by faith to Christ have been changed from enemies to friends, from those away from Him to those in His presence, from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of God.
INTO HIS OWN PRESENCE
The most blessed result of this glorious work of Christ? We have been returned “into [God’s] own presence.” We not only have access to this “grace in which we now stand,” but we can live unceasingly in the place from which all blessings flow, for everything flows from the presence of the Lord. Everything.
“God desires a continual, daily, personal relationship with us, but we must cooperate. His presence is our greatest need, and our presence is His great desire.” (From, “The Presence Centered Life”)
Hallelujah for the Father, orchestrating the great rescue! Hallelujah for the Son, being willing to take on human flesh and die in our place to bring us back into God’s presence! Hallelujah for the Spirit who comes to reside in us and give us access to God’s presence constantly … the One who is now with us and in us! We can now abide in His presence, which is the answer to every problem we have.
February 20, 2025
If you have questions about how real, how present, how personal and intimate the Lord is, then just read six words of travelogue in Luke’s journal as he traveled with Paul.
February 18, 2025
I have known many people who have had great joy and power in the midst of great suffering. It is humbling that the slightest inconveniences deter many of us from following God. We have not gotten to the bottom—settled the issue. Most often, we live for our comfort, reputation, or gain. When any of those goals are touched, we are troubled and discontent.
February 17, 2025
The repentant who finds God gains everything. “He who has God and everything else,” said C.S. Lewis, “has no more than he who has God alone.”
