Week 4: Seeing the Face of God

contributed by Exec. Pastor Craig Luper

Monday 2/25

Reading: Psalm 34:3
“Glorify the Lord with me; let us exalt his name together.”

In seeing the face of the Lord we enter His courts and glorify Him, pushing everything besides Him into the background. We focus not on ourselves, but “fixing our eyes on Jesus,” we adore Him for who He is. We do not ask anything from Him, but only love Him and adore Him. We boast in the Lord (I Corinthians 1:29). Loveliness has great power in it. When we get a glimpse of Him, we change. We seek Him to give Him honor and receive His love.

Start the first of the week off right by glorifying the Lord, and exalting His name!

Tuesday 2/26

Reading: Romans 8:15
“For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.”

In seeing the face of God, we must remember that we did not receive a spirit of bondage, but the Spirit of adoption, in which we cry out, Abba, Father. One of the many faces of God is the Father’s face. Many people see God as a very hard taskmaster, not as a loving father. But he is really the loving daddy. He’s the Luke 15 father standing on the porch waiting for his son to come home. Not to scold him or tell him “I told you so,” but to love him, put a robe on him (symbolizing covering shame and guilt) and rejoice because his son once was lost, but has now come home. Today, take some time to look into the face of a loving father and see how much he loves you.

Wednesday 2/27

Reading: Micah 7:18
“Who is a God like you, who pardons sin and forgives the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance? You do not stay angry forever but delight to show mercy.”

One of the awesome faces of God is the Passionate, Pursuing, and Loving God. He is constantly chasing after us, wooing us, loving us. How amazing is that? Isaiah says, “Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you; he rise to show you. For the Lord is a God of justice.” God longs to be gracious to us, he’s not looking to whip us at the first offense. I John says that God first loved us, we didn’t pursue Him, he pursued us first! He passionately, loves you! Doesn’t matter what you feel like today, whether you believe that or not, IT IS A FACT. So today just look to the Father that is passionately, pursuing you and draw near to Him.

Thursday 2/28

Reading: Psalm 23

“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want….”

One of the great images of the face of God is that of a Shepherd. Psalm 23 is such a great snap shot of what the Shepherd (God) does for his sheep. He brings rest to my weary soul; He leads me to quiet places so that my soul may be restored. He guides me, and when I walk through those valleys of darkness I don’t have to fear anything; because the Shepherd is there to defend me. He prepares a table for me, because He knows my needs, and He fills me with His Spirit and when He fills me my cup overflows. His goodness and love follow me where ever I go, and He gives me a promise that I will dwell with Him in His house. WOW

Friday 2/29

Reading: Zephaniah 3:16,17
“The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing.”

I want you think about 3 things out of this verse. First thing is that God takes great delight in you! Yes, you.
You say, “How could He delight in me, I’ve done so many bad things?” He just does, doesn’t matter what you’ve done; he delights in you.
Second thing in this verse is that he will quiet you with his love.
In the midst of turmoil, heartache, financial problems, martial problems; He comes and quiets you with his love. Not with empty and vain promises but with an everlasting love.
The third thing in this verse is that he rejoices over you with singing.
God thinks so much about you and is so crazy about you that he rejoices over you with songs that He has made up for especially you. So today as you drive down the road or sit in your office, or in the living room; see a God who is mighty to save, and takes great delight in you and will quiet you in all that you are going through, and rejoices over you with singing. Now that’s an awesome God.

Week 3: Obeying the Voice of God

Contributed by Joshua Fletcher

Monday 2/18

During week 1 we talked about attending to God’s Presence. Then, last week Craig taught us about hearing the voice of God. This week is about obeying the voice of God. We will take last week’s verses and ask ourselves some challenging questions. God speaks not only so that we will listen but so that we will obey as well.

Reading: Song of Solomon 5:2,
“I was asleep, but my heart was awake. A voice! My beloved was knocking; open to me.”

Hearing the voice of God is a spiritual discipline that takes time to develop, but if one’s heart is awake then a knock is sure to come. The Lord will speak when you open the door to Him. Are you prepared for the knock? Sit with this question a while. Test your motives for listening. Are you waiting for your beloved or are you waiting for a deliveryman bearing gifts?
What is the lord saying to you? Is there an invitation to deeper intimacy? What does that look like for you? Perhaps what you are asking of Him is not of first importance. What is He asking of you? Will you obey Him when He speaks?

Tuesday 2/19

Reading: Matthew 5:8
“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”

How much do you want to see God?
When I go grocery shopping I am constantly comparing the cost versus the benefit of purchasing this item or that item, preparing this meal of that meal, and then there are those items I splurge on because I simply want a treat. I am also training for a triathlon and often those treats are little barriers to my training. Little by little they keep me from my goals.
What barriers are keeping you from seeing Jesus? What do you need to eliminate from your life for the sake of your relationship with Jesus? What things cost more than the benefit? What things do you need to eliminate from your diet? Are you willing to deal ruthlessly with sin in your life? The promise to see God goes to the pure in heart!

Wednesday 2/20

Reading: I Chronicles 11: 10-19

“…oh, that someone would get me a drink of water from the well near the gate of Bethlehem!”

Last week Craig discussed the radical and risky behavior of David’s men when they heard David’s desire for home. Despite their tiredness, they risked their lives to get him a drink from the wells of Jerusalem to cure his homesickness.
What would you risk to please the Lord? If we earnestly seek to hear the voice of God it is likely that we will draw near to the Lord’s deepest desires for us and for others. The Lord reveals His heart for a purpose. Often God is inviting us to join Him.
What type of attitude will you bring when you draw near to Jesus? Will you let courageous obedience be a defining mark of your character or something much less? Are you willing to bolt through enemy territory to bring the King a cup of cold water?

Thursday 2/21

Reading: Psalm 46: 10

“Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.”

This verse is often quoted in times of distress and worry. It is comforting to hear the Lord’s command to be still and the sure statement that God will be “exalted” even amidst difficult circumstances. But perhaps there is another way to read this verse. Perhaps stillness brings exaltation.
When we are still, when we stop to hear His voice and believe in Jesus, something incredible happens! The noise, the din of the world, is silenced and we hear the God of the universe speak to us. Our souls respond to God with exaltation. We exalt Him right in the middle of our circumstances and then things don’t seem so overwhelming anymore. Perhaps the first and most immediate response of our hearts to the voice of God should be worship.
What is your first and most immediate response to God’s Word? Are you overcoming the din with stillness? Are you worshiping God through your present circumstances?

Friday 2/22

Reading: Ephesians 1: 17-19

“I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe.”

An amazing prayer for us from the pen of a man who knew God’s Spirit of wisdom and revelation and experienced God’s power in his life. What would you do if you began to receive the Spirit Paul asks God to send on His people?

Make a list of your hearts deepest desires? Share that list with a spiritual companion and pray together about these dreams. Ask the Lord to align your heart with His heart then have your spiritual friend begin to pray Paul’s prayer above for you regularly.

God has a plan for us all, a calling. We are His children and none of us are here without a purpose. It may be a long journey, but God has somewhere to take you. The first steps of obedience are always to believe and surrender. How are you taking these steps?

Week 2: Hearing the Voice of God

Contributed by Exec. Pastor Craig Luper

Monday 2/11

Reading: Song of Solomon 5:2,
“I was asleep, but my heart was awake. A voice! My beloved was knocking; open to me.”

Fifteen times the statement, “He that has ears to hear, let him hear,” appears in the New Testament. This indicates two things for us:

1. A basic premise: having ears to hear
2. A basic choice: choosing to use those ears to hear

If the capacity is there, the ability must be developed. All of us have the ability to hear the voice of the Lord, it is a choice that we make in choosing to use our ears. I want to give you a secret in learning to hear the voice of the Lord.

First Secret: Hearing God must be vital to you – If it is vital then it is perceived necessary or important to life. The things that are important to us in life, we make time for and make sure that we do them. In hearing the voice of the Lord it has to be vital to us, or we will not choose to hear Him. Only when it’s convenient or comfortable to us.

So today choose to “have ears to hear” and listen to the voice of the Father.

Tuesday 2/12

Reading: Matthew 5:8
“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.”

In hearing the voice of the Lord it is so important that our hearts are pure before Him. Our hearts must be pure with a desire to follow God only. How do we attain that purity of heart? The process takes time and action on our part, but is guided by the Holy Spirit in the life of the sincere, cooperative believer. And it includes definite procedures.

#1 – Cleansing – Do you know the difference between forgiveness and cleansing? Forgiveness has to do with the results of sin. Cleansing has to do with the cause of sin. Forgiveness comes by confession and restitution. Cleansing comes by walking in the light: “God is light; in him there is no darkness…If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth; but if we walk in the light as He Himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.” (I John 5:7)

Many of us keep asking God for forgiveness for the same sins, over and over and over again. The reason is that we have never experienced cleansing. The cause of the sins has not been eradicated. If the top of the sin-weed is cut off, for a short while it cannot be seen on the surface. But the weed will soon be back again, unless it is pulled out by its root. When we keep committing certain sins, we need to ask God to show us the root, the cause of our disobedience.

To “walk in the light” means the Lord will be asking you to make a lifestyle change.

#2 – Circumcision – What is a circumcised heart? How do I get one? What will be its results?
First remember that all the physical rules of the Old Testament were just shadows of spiritual realities. This is sometimes hard to understand, but Paul clearly spells it out in his letter to the Romans: “A person is not a true Jew if he is only a Jew in his physical body. True circumcision is not only on the outside of the body. For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly; neither is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, but the Spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not from men but from God.” (Romans 2:28,29)

Cleansing takes care of the roots. Circumcision takes care of the good but unnecessary things that crowd out God. Circumcision is both our part and God’s.

Wednesday 2/13

Reading: I Chronicles 11: 10-19

“…oh, that someone would get me a drink of water from the well near the gate of Bethlehem!”

Here’s the story, David and his men had been fighting the enemies and doing battle, they were tired and worn out. They were “holed” up at the cave of Adullam, and David was just longing for the good ole days. Three of David’s mighty warriors came down to the cave to be with David and they happen to just hear David talking to himself. And David is saying, “I would really like to have a drink of water from my wells in Bethlehem.” The men heard this and they bolted through enemy lines, risked their lives to just get their commander, chief and king a drink from the wells from home. What an incredible story, but one that is for you and I as we seek to hear the Father’s voice everyday.

First of all these three guys had to be in the presence of the king to even hear his wishes. James says, “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to us.” The intimacy of the Father’s presence is something sought by relatively few people. These three guys drew near to their king. When is the last time we’ve drawn near to Him? It is a choice to draw near for each of us.

Secondly these three guys took risks, but the rewards outweighed the risks. To hear the voice of the Lord means that we will take risks, but the rewards far outweigh the risks. Are you risking to hear Him?

Are you close enough to the Father to even hear His whisper? It’s a choice and a privilege that we have!

Thursday 2/14

Reading: Psalm 46: 10

“Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.”

In listening to the voice of the Lord, sometimes we just have to quiet ourselves to hear him. We have noise all around us, in the car, at the house, in the streets. Everything around us is screaming to get our attention. And the one thing or person that we should be listening to is Him! David gives us some clues in hearing the voice of the Lord.

First is to be still – to be still means; “to hush, silent, to be relaxed, to cease. To hear his voice we need to just hush, stop talking, relax and cease from all the things that we are doing to just be in His presence. I encourage you to take 5, 10, 30 minutes to just “hush,” you will be amazed at what you will hear.

The second thing David says is to “know,” – what is it that we are to know? To know Him! The word “know” means to experience. So as we hush ourselves, we begin to experience God! Wow! This isn’t a head thing but the Lord God Almighty comes and draws near to us and we experience Him!

So today just “hush” yourself and experience Him!

Friday 2/15

Reading: Ephesians 1: 17-19

“I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe.”

Paul’s prayer for the people at Ephesus was so timely and important to them; in their walk with the Lord and also their continuing hearing and listening to the Lord. That prayer is still so important to you and I today. As you are listening to the Lord today ask Him to give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation. Why? So that you can know Him better. To “know” means to experience Him. As the Lord gives you wisdom and revelation you’ll begin to go deeper in your love and understanding of Him.

Pray Paul’s prayer right now!