When we encounter God, it is often not during our devotional times. Sometimes a shock of grace suddenly floods over us while doing some mundane task. Once it happened to me while walking down a school hall before a parent-teacher conference. The goodness of God, and his love for my children, seemed to come out of nowhere and overwhelmed me. God’s active Presence or touches of virtue show up at the most unexpected places. He enjoys surprising us. The reason for this is that communion with God is initiated on both sides—God’s and ours.
How he longs for us to notice him, to appreciate whatever it is he is doing. He goes to extremes to capture our attention. Much of the time, we don’t recognize his nudges and whispers, or that he has just orchestrated some event or happenstance especially for us. But if we try to be more aware of him, our lives can become prayer itself.
Brother Lawrence, who is known for “Practicing the Presence of God,” said this: “It’s rude to ignore a friend who is in your company.”
His prayer life was a habit that he cultivated. It wasn’t easy for him at first. Nor is it easy for us. But if we can have that kind of intimacy with Him, we’d be truly blessed. After all, we are to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thess. 5:17).
Prayer can be simply a natural expression of being attentive to God. When we learn to savor God, to enjoy his company, and appreciate the things he is doing, then we are truly alive. It is to live in “holy ordinariness.”
At first glance, this seems like an oxymoron, but it really isn’t, not if “your life is hidden in Christ with God” (Col. 3:3).
First of all, God is holy and we are ordinary. Put the two together, we have holy-ordinariness. This explains the life of “unceasing prayer.” To grasp this concept we must think a bit creatively.
We must become everyday artists and look for the “blazing fire of God” in the common bushes of life. We must look openly for God in those who come across our path, for we will see the beauty of God’s face on sometimes the most unlikely ones. We will see him in unexpected places, revealing his love and grace to us. He hopes we will notice.
We must learn to see. In order to be aware of him, we must become more reflective. Otherwise, we will fly through our days and forget he’s with us. If we ignore him for too long, life will be wearisome and empty. Jesus called this being “lukewarm” because the heart has grown indifferent. He loathes us to be that way when he knows we could have incredible joy. If we become dull towards God and his doings in our life, we will fall intoself-life and miss all the wonders we’ve been destined to experience.
Living for “self” isn’t always obvious. Immorality and greed, or base and hurtful behavior, this is. But not so easy to see, is the person who outwardly lives a Christian life. She might even be a missionary, or he could be a pastor of a church. But that person may not be experiencing the “… ‘blissful center’ which is our right and proper dwelling place . . . the loss of which is the cause of our unceasing restlessness.”[1]
That person’s center may be about what they “do” for God. It could be that that person is looking for “life,” including his sense of value or worth, from the wrong things.
The enjoyed presence of God is the inheritance of every believer and it is meant to be constant. We have been designed for pleasure—for God made each of us, specially, to know and enjoy him. We cannot flee from his presence, even if we wanted to. He is always with us.
We have his undivided attention at all times, but this is a wonder we find hard to grasp. He knows the number of the hairs of our head at any given moment. We cannot imagine a God so big, or a God so caring. We might know this about him in our minds. But do we experience this knowing?
If we are honest with ourselves we will recognize restlessness, a yearning for the presence of God. We need to pay attention to specific aching desires in our hearts—like, for example, perhaps you feel a strong desire to go to the library and are simply craving to read a good story, or a Christian book. This might be God drawing you because there is one there on the bookshelves that he wants you to read for whatever reason he might have; perhaps he has something he wants to teach you or show you.
Listen to your desires. If you love God, he will put desires into your heart. Sometimes, if we pay close enough attention, we can know that God is leading us through a sudden urge. But one must learn to pay attention, to notice your own inner stirrings.
So often, though, we are too busy, too driven to recognize our longings or desires, let alone quiet urges. Oh, the still small voice of God—if life is so noisy, so full, how will we hear? Often, we keep ourselves so occupied it is because we are empty and are trying to find meaning in everything else but what God wants to give us. Oh, that we would stop running from him in this way.
Then there is another problem. Sometimes, we do give God the time to speak to us, but it is more of a “task to accomplish” or a thing to cross of our “to-do list”—how dreadful to treat the amazing Lover of your soul as a task.
If your devotional times have become a should thing, rather than a want thing—you might be living up to your neck in the self–life. Where is that longing for God himself? Is it hidden in activity and possessions, or in accomplishing things for him?
We cannot obey the first commandment to love God with all of our heart, without holy fire—that is to say, passion. Pray God will blow on the coals if they’ve gone cold. Beg God to rekindle your first love. He wants it more than you. God makes us to love him. But he does not make us love him. And when Divine love is true, it is an unstoppable fire. Our love for him begins in his heart. Without God’s pursuit of us, we cannot know or love him. He takes the initiative. We can only respond. God wants us to dance with him.
Our Beloved is our constant companion, our closest friend and lover. He waits for us. He sends favors our way and then watches for our response. He touches us in personal blessings, only we can know, and then he studies our hearts and minds. He is inside of us and can do this. God is forever initiating something. He is tireless in his pursuits. He loves us without limit. It may seem too good to be true—but this is Truth: God is stunningly good.
We must pay attention and notice what he is doing for us. We need to be still. Turn off the noise, turn off the computer or TV, and the inner brain activity. Sit down and open up to him, with no agenda. Get a tablet of paper and listen to his thoughts that may come. Read the Bible and listen for the Rhema (the “now”) Word in the Logos (the “written”) Word. Waste time on your Beloved. Reflect often and pay earnest attention to life and what God is doing in it. Let God love you. This is the highest calling you have in life.