Today I am excited to get the opportunity to talk with you about just how available our Lord is to each and every one, us in our day to day lives. How we are able to use our freedom in God, to call upon God, and then to listen to what God is saying to each of us.
Granted it’s the listening part that gets a little convoluted and difficult for many of us. But before I even attempt to address the weak-link in our relationship in God (us), I would like to explore with you just how available the Lord is, in your life, and how free we are in Him. Beginning with the clear fact that our faith is free of legalistic form and style rules that human beings continually bough down our walk in the Lord. Reading from Galatians 5:1;
5It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.
That slavery is the idea that we have to:
- Use a middleman to reach God.
- We don’t, God has wanted a real relationship with all of us from the very beginning.
- Pray a certain way and perfectly
- We need to be praying and be in a real relationship in and with God where we share, then listen to Him!
- Recite dogma and creeds
- We need to know our Bible and repeat what we know from it solely and steadfastly.
In fact, Paul is consistent in our freedoms in Christ throughout his letters to the early Churches. Reminding me of the instruction of Paul to the Church in Colossae, reading from Colossians 2:16-19;
16 Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. 17 These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ. 18 Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you. Such a person also goes into great detail about what they have seen; they are puffed up with idle notions by their unspiritual mind. 19 They have lost connection with the head, from whom the whole body, supported and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows as God causes it to grow.
Why is all this important? We get so wrapped up in the proper and appropriate way to come before our Lord that we let form and style starve our substance and depth in our faith in our Lord. If I am in a real relationship with the Lord, I am clinging to Him and walking with and in Him, and beginning to know Him on my own. I am sharing my best and unfortunately my worst with the one I am surrendering all to.
After a while our lives and relationships in the Lord might even start to reflect an ongoing dialog that happens when any two of us become very close. For and idea of how that dialog might develop in the Lord, we have today’s Call to Worship from David in Psalm 138;
1 I will praise you, Lord, with all my heart;
before the “gods” I will sing your praise.
*Interrupting just to say; those gods that David is speaking of are the fake things and people that we place way too much credence to in our lives. David is going to praise God in the midst of the beautiful people in life, the elites, powerbrokers, and the self-affirmed important ones of life, and sing our God’s praises. Making me wonder how many times, I cowered and didn’t use my freedom to Praise, glorify, and magnify our God’s Holy and Precious Name before all others.
David continues now at verse 2;
2 I will bow down toward your holy temple
and will praise your name
for your unfailing love and your faithfulness,
for you have so exalted your solemn decree
that it surpasses your fame.
3 When I called, you answered me;
you greatly emboldened me.
**Or, as today’s Message Title Illustrates; “Ask, & He will Surge Our Strength of Soul” When we use our freedom to call upon Him who made all, we will find ourselves emboldened and our very souls strengthened in His Majesty. Continuing now with verse 4;
4 May all the kings of the earth praise you, Lord,
when they hear what you have decreed.
5 May they sing of the ways of the Lord,
for the glory of the Lord is great.
6 Though the Lord is exalted, he looks kindly on the lowly;
though lofty, he sees them from afar.
7 Though I walk in the midst of trouble,
you preserve my life.
You stretch out your hand against the anger of my foes;
with your right hand you save me.
8 The Lord will vindicate me;
your love, Lord, endures forever—
do not abandon the works of your hands.
Here we have David, speaking with God and unburdening himself before God. Openly saying; that all that he (David) is in life is due to the Lord. David says; don’t abandon me! So important,… is our recognized dependance on God, because it brings God honor, praise, and joy (What you and I were made to do), and because it’s true. Additionally, David throughout the Psalms is speaking his own mind on other matters and people he knows in life, who do not believe or pay due credence to God. His recognizing, our realizing the cold hard truths in life, and how corrupt the world can be, brings us even deeper resolution to live in relationship in and with our God.
What is so awesome to me is that all of us are offered a real relationship like David has with the Lord. Not his individual relationship, because that wont work for you. Yours is a one-of-a-kind unique relationship that is always going in a direction (hopefully towards God), and is evolving as you are growing in the Lord. For some additional insight on our growth into the Lord, and who our Lord is, we have again Paul’s letter to the early church. Reading this time, Colossians 2:6-15;
6 So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, 7 rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.
*Interrupting to say; A life of gratitude is truly the beginning of a full life in our Lord! Continuing now;
8 See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ.
9 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, 10 and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority. 11 In him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not performed by human hands. Your whole self ruled by the flesh was put off when you were circumcised by Christ, 12 having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through your faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.
**Interrupting once again; That in our freedom in God we can go directly to the Lord and call upon Him, and bypass the pomp, tradition, ceremony, bureaucracy, dogma, rules, plus form and style, to have a relationship sincere and deep. In our Lord there is a time for ceremony, and a time for reflection, a time for praising, glorifying, and magnifying His wonderful name, and a time for deep reflection, dedication, and private devotion. All make up what becomes a real connection in our Lord.
Resuming with Paul in Colossians 2, verse 16;
13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.
This is who we are called to come to in prayer. The one who has saved us from us, and does each and every day that we turn unto Him.
God is really less than a prayer away, for we know that even before we are finished in our prayers, God already knows our hearts and is with us, even when we are not all that available to Him through our selfishness, fears, greed, and pettiness. When we are able to leave that stuff behind, we really do reflect today’s message title statement; Ask, & He will Surge Our Strength of Soul
So how do we go about refreshing our very being, find answers, and open ourselves to our God in Prayer? Today’s Message Reading is just about that. Reading again Luke 11:1-13;
1 One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.”
2 He said to them, “When you pray, say:
“‘Father,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come.
3 Give us each day our daily bread.
4 Forgive us our sins,
for we also forgive everyone who sins against us.
And lead us not into temptation.’”
*Side Bar; This is part of the prayer we pray each week in Worship Service to remind us how to form a prayer, and to teach our young, when we have young how to steadfastly come to God in prayer. Beginning with the obvious, by praising our Father’s name, then stating the fact of all will end in our God’s design, we ask for daily sustenance, and forgiveness, and remind ourselves that we are in the forgiving business. Finally, we are instructed to ask for our Lord’s help in avoiding the temptation to sin. For God tests us, but He doesn’t tempt us like we invariably tempt by our fallen attitudes and behavior. Continuing now at verse 5;
5 Then Jesus said to them, “Suppose you have a friend, and you go to him at midnight and say, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread; 6 a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have no food to offer him.’ 7 And suppose the one inside answers, ‘Don’t bother me. The door is already locked, and my children and I are in bed. I can’t get up and give you anything.’ 8 I tell you, even though he will not get up and give you the bread because of friendship, yet because of your shameless audacity he will surely get up and give you as much as you need.
9 “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
11 “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
Incredible words indeed, because they are words of life, and the doorway into your eternity. Our Lord, makes His case about God’s generosity, by showing us how we try to take care of the people we love, or even just know in our own lives. If we are willing to sacrifice for others even when we are in conflict with them, how much more will your God who loves you in spite of you, do for you?
God is always answering prayer, it just for many of us, we don’t either like the answer, or God’s impeccable timing, which is not like our own. Perhaps, the next time we step back and take a breath to reflect the majesty that is Him, and the travesty which is me at times, I need to be thinking about a couple of things in my own prayer life. They are;
- Why do I like a child keep asking for things that are not good for me?
- Why do I keep on believing that I know what best when I haven’t asked Him what is best?
- Why is it the stuff I keep wanting are in conflict with scripture?
- Why am I not asking for people I disagree with to hear what God has to say instead of what I have to say, which is often in error?
- Will I ever grow up and become a mature Christian?
These questions are just the beginning of a life that is ever growing and developing in our walk with and in Him, who has our best interest in mind.
So, what does all this have to do with the title on the sign out front; Ask, & He will Surge Our Strength of Soul? Well, this. When we continually ask for help in our Lord to be able to glorify God by our behavior, God will grow us according to our being ready to grow in Him and His plan.
The hardest thing about being a fallen person in a fallen world is that its hard for us to understand what we are not ready to grasp. For all of you, my hope and prayer are that as you walk your Faithwalk in your beautiful lives that you are building with the Lord, that you not loose hope, or forget how much God loves you, and how free you are to call upon Him! God bless you!
Amen!