What is the quickest way that God draws you back to Him?  Is it pain as with my separation, perhaps tragedy, loneliness, distance or shame?  You know that state that you cannot withstand, that predicament that will cause you to cry out for mercy, salvation and deliverance.  Do you feel the longing, a barrier or space between you and God?  Does it make you queezy, uneasy or sad?

I crave that thing which brings me immediately into God’s Presence.  Unfortunately for those around me it is usually a reminder of my inadequacy brought on by a much needed lesson in humility delivered to my doorstep, because He loves me enough to do so.  God doesn’t like being away from me.  I know, I cannot know the mind or heart of God.  I am simply assuming, because every time I walk away from Him doing my own thing, He gives me the exact pitch I cannot hit, the relationship I cannot resolve or the difficulty I cannot overcome.  And zam zoom, I am right back where I should have been all along, on my knees asking the Lord for assistance.  The problem with my behavior is that if I had listened in the first place and recognized my consuming desire for God’s Love and Approval, I never would have had to force His hand into teaching me the lesson.  I know that is probably backwards logic, because He knew before the beginning of time that He was going to have to provide me the opportunity to once again learn the same lesson I had missed the last, it seems one-hundred thousand times.   But it does bring me some comfort in my idiocy to think that God loves me that much.

I cannot bear my brokenness, hard head and heartedness, heck sometimes I cannot even test the waters of thinking I am in any small measure useful for God’s Good Pleasure.  But that is exactly where I should have been in the first place, because it was never my talent that He found useful.  I am most appealing as an empty vase, tarnished, chipped, cracked and half lacquered.  The irony for man is that we matter so much to Him that He came to save us then use as vessels and conduits for His majesty.  That is so deep it is a bottom I cannot fathom.  All I know is that I need Him.  Not just ever day, but ever moment of every day.  And the most painful idea is that I ever wasted a moment thinking that I could do it on my own, because I cannot.  I admit it.  I need God even more than air for air simply sustains me in life where God will be my foundation through eternity.  Please Lord don’t let me wander far and allow me to escape the pain that it apparently requires to keep me conscious of my place in the universe.  But, my worst fear is that you just let me go and for that I would suffer all the promptings, however painful if they always brought me back to the place I belong, under the shadow and shelter of Your Mighty Wings.  Praise You Father in the Awesome Name of Jesus.