Seeking God with Your Whole Being
This mornings devotional comes from Charles Spurgeon’s classic devotional Morning and Evening. Spurgeon writes about Job’s burning desire to find God in the midst of his pain. It consumed his very being:
Finding God by Charles Haddon Spurgeon
“O that I knew where I might find Him!”–Job 23:3
In Job’s uttermost extremity he cried after the Lord. The longing desire of an afflicted child of God is once more to see his Father’s face. His first prayer is not “O that I might be healed of the disease which now festers in every part of my body!” nor even “O that I might see my children restored from the jaws of the grave, and my property once more brought from the hand of the spoiler!” but the first and uppermost cry is, “O that I knew where I might find HIM, who is my God! that I might come even to His seat!” God’s children run home when the storm comes on. It is the heaven-born instinct of a gracious soul to seek shelter from all ills beneath the wings of Jehovah. “He that hath made his refuge God,” might serve as the title of a true believer. A hypocrite, when afflicted by God, resents the infliction, and, like a slave, would run from the Master who has scourged him; but not so the true heir of heaven, he kisses the hand which smote him, and seeks shelter from the rod in the bosom of the God who frowned upon him.
Job’s desire to commune with God was intensified by the failure of all other sources of consolation. The patriarch turned away from his sorry friends, and looked up to the celestial throne, just as a traveller turns from his empty skin bottle, and betakes himself with all speed to the well. He bids farewell to earth-born hopes, and cries, “O that I knew where I might find my God!” Nothing teaches us so much the preciousness of the Creator, as when we learn the emptiness of all besides. Turning away with bitter scorn from earth’s hives, where we find no honey, but many sharp stings, we rejoice in Him whose faithful word is sweeter than honey or the honeycomb. In every trouble we should first seek to realize God’s presence with us. Only let us enjoy His smile, and we can bear our daily cross with a willing heart for His dear sake.
This is a public domain version of Morning and Evening.
Have you ever been in an inconsolable place in which you had nothing but God? How did it feel?
though I have ever been in a place where everyone and everything denied me; this message up has given me new challenges. “He didn’t ask God for his past; he didn’t run away from the one who smote him but the more he was smitted, the more he came closer to his GOD. Blessings.
I am in that pace at this point and time in my life. All that i want to do is draw closer to GOD in all the that i do. And I am a believer that the GOD that I serve will heal me in the Mighty name of Christ Jesus.
How did I feel? Hopeless. Like some large tentacle pierced through me and drained me of all energy. I had truly come to the end of myself. As I started reading God’s word (12 years ago), I found Ephesians 3:20.
I was in the park reading while my young son was playing. I didn’t have enough gasoline go back to my roommates home who had taken us in, and still make an evening service she had invited us to.
I broke down crying and I ask God as I looked up through the open sun roof of my car: “More of you? Less of me? and you will do EXCEEDINGLY…ABUNDANTLY…more than I could ask OR THINK? If you don’t stand on this promise then my so-called intellectual friends that say you do not exist would be correct…AND do you know what kind of imagination I have?….MORE THAN I CAN ASK OR THINK?”
As in ANY relationship, for it to BE a relationship, it requires action and commitment on both sides. I went to work! I was sin sick of me.. it really wasn’t that hard to want less of me…I didn’t like me any way, what was left of me. I look at pictures of myself from back then and stare into my own eyes and wonder?…”WHO did I think I was?”
I depend on His word daily. There IS a spiritual transformation from word to spirit no matter how many times you read the Bible. Just like with food: without a regular intake of it you will die! Memory recall is not enough! You may remember how food smells, how it taste, or the sound of it sizziling, but you must intake to stay alive. So don’t deceive yourself by saying you have read it from cover to cover and then try to rely on memory recall.
BTW: 18 months later from that day in the park? That HOMELESS day in the park? … I was having a footer dug for our new home. No husband, no boyfriend, just me my little child and an ever present unseen hand that belongs to Jesus! A faithful Jesus!
Thank you for posting this devotional, and to the people that responded. I have gone through a lot in my life, and I feel now at this moment health that I have not felt in years. I have been going through something the last few months and even years. But today I feel better because Christ Jesus has blessed me and helped me. I hope to continue to be blessed by Christ Jesus. I have been through many storms in my life. It reminds me of the poem “Footsteps in The Sand”. I want to do God’s will. Christ Jesus Loves me, and I hope that I will always remember that he does. I pray for the love of Christ Jesus to continue to work in my life. I pray for my family and friends. I pray for all of us. I Love the Peace and comfort that Christ Jesus gives me. God most certainly is Good!
Thank You God!
Perry Mobley
Thank you for that is too how I feel. My prayer to God is that I must recognize his voice, that I will know him, that I will obey him, and be led by his spirit so that I will glorify his name.