THE HEARTBEAT OF A HUNGRY HEART
The practicality and commonsense of living each day out of everything You are & everything You do in me and through me is questioned, doubted and even ridiculed by fellow Christians!
How, they say, can all of life, especially the mundane “everyday kinda stuff”, happen if we are not making it happen?
“Why did God give me a brain, anyway?”
“Why did He give me a will if He didn’t want me using it?”
“Does God really have an opinion on what color tie I wear or the kind of curtains I have on my windows?”
“How can it be that I end up where I’m supposed to be,
right-time/right-place, doing what’s best, thinking right, feeling great and speaking truth in love that edifies the hearer just by simply occupying my mind with Jesus Christ? Can’t be! Sounds stupid!”
My heart cries out, “Please bear with me in a little foolishness... For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, so that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin.
But I am afraid for you that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of Christ.”(2 Cor. 11:1-3)
Yes, occupying my mind with Jesus is the answer to everything!
Oh, Lord, experiencing Your loving-kindness (Hebrew for grace) is better than life! (Ps 63:3) If I’m not experiencing that, then why live?
On the contrary, to live life apart from the flow, day-in/day-out, of Your abundant grace, of Your very Life flowing through me is disheartening and downright frightening!
Forget the lost condition of being “without You and without hope in the world” (horrible thought), what about having You for heaven, but, while on earth, living “severed from Christ and “fallen from grace”? (Gal. 5:4)
How miserable! No, I need you to be my Life, my all, my resource for everything!
Otherwise, what drudgery! What crushing pressure to perform! What high prospects for frustration, disillusionment and failure!
If, as a Christian, I must face life (my responsibilities & obligations), make decisions, execute the right activity to navigate through adverse circumstances and fulfill my roles as husband, father, minister and businessman, all by counting on my best efforts, my reasoning powers and my energy: then,
I might as well die and go to heaven now!
If victory over temptation, freedom from bondage to sin and harmful attitudes/behaviors is achieved & maintained by my will power, then
I must accept defeat!
But, if by simply “receiving (moment-by-moment) the abundance of Your grace and the gift of Your righteousness,
I can reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ” (Rom 5:17), then life becomes a tremendously exciting and fulfilling adventure!
To walk by the “rule” of the new creation (Gal. 6:15-16), in conscious realization and acceptance of the supernatural transformation that started at my new birth and continues in dramatic fashion as I participate in my oneness with Christ in His death and resurrection is the mysterious awe-inspiring experience life was designed to be!
“I would despair and faint if I did not believe that I would see Your goodness in the land of the living” (Ps 27:13)
The longing of my heart, as it hungers after You, is “to see Your divine power grace-gifting me everything pertaining to life and godliness having become a partaker of Your divine nature. (2 Pet.1:3)
Yes, this is the kind of life I hunger after; experiencing the very Life of the indwelling Lord Jesus manifesting itself through my mortal flesh, becoming unto me wisdom (manifold commonsense), love, peace, patience, kindness, “self-control” and inner happiness (constant joy).
Nothing could be more practical, more powerful or any more in accordance with Your Word than to ask and believe that
“You would grace-gift me, according to the riches of Your glory, to be strengthened with power through Your Spirit in my inner man: so that Christ may dwell in my heart through faith and that I would know the mystical experience of the love of Christ, which surpasses knowledge, in order that I may be filled up to all the fullness of You, God, my Father (Eph.3:16-19)! This is the heartbeat of a hungry heart!