Knowing God Intimately # 3a
You can never come to know God deeply with CASUAL CONVERSATION or even by your prayer requests. Intimacy with Him requires much time spent alone with Him. The deepest working of the Holy Spirit comes during the time spent alone in His presence. When we set time aside for fellowship with God we’re entering into the richest experience of the Christian life. You were created for fellowship, fellowship with God. This is the only thing that will satisfy the desires of man.
I) Let’s pick up were we left off last. EXO 34:29–30.
A) Moses was in the presence of God for 40 days. There was a dramatic outward effect – an unconscious effect.
1) . Moses was not even aware of the shine of God’s glory on his face.
2) (This will also happen to you.) [New birth people change on the outside.]
a) You may not shine as Moses did, but through your communion and fellowship with God YOUR LIFE AND ATTITUDES will be greatly affected.
b) The change in your life will be just as impressive as the shine of God’s glory upon Moses. (Joy, peace, your attitudes, God’s power, and victory.)
3) As you enter into God’s presence in worship and shut out the distractions of your mind, you step into the Holy of Holies.
a) That is the sanctuary of the Lord, and you enter in spirit to the place of nearness to God.
B) In the book of Ezekiel we find some priests who were faithful to minister unto God, so let’s turn there. Ezekiel 44:15-16.
1) The sons of Zadok continued to enter the sanctuary even when others had abandoned God. (“Zadok” means “RIGHTEOUS” in the Hebrew).
2) In the following Vs. they were told not to where anything into the inner court that may cause them to PERSPIRE.
a) Then, when they went to the outer court to minister to the people, the CLOTHES they wore while ministering to God were LEFT BEHIND so they would not become contaminated.
3) When you come into His presents you know that Jesus has already gone before you to prepare the way.
a) You can enter with complete confidence because He has GIVEN you His ROBE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS through your simple faith in Him.
b) It’s NOT BY YOUR OWN PERSPIRATION, not even your work for God, that brings you near to Him, but only by your confidence in Jesus’ sacrifice and a willingness to enter.
4) He said, “They shall come near to me to minister to me.” This is service to God that can be done no other way.
a) You must come before Him. You cannot serve Him from a distance.
b) The OUTER COURT is where YOU APPROACH PEOPLE, (where you minister to people and do things for God in service) but the INNER COURT is where you APPROACH GOD.
c) Many times we feel that all we do in the outer court (ministering and serving people) gives us a good excuse for not drawing near to God in the inner court.
(i) But WITHOUT CLOSENESS TO GOD through fellowship and through ministry to Him in your inner chamber, you’ll find that your WORK for God is simply DONE IN THE FLESH.
5) It seems that there is a lot of sweat in today’s ministries and little waiting quietly in the presence of God to obtain His counsel and wisdom.
a) I want God to look at me and my service to Him and say as He did about the sons of Zadok, “He shall be my minister and shall stand before me.”
b) Your input will determine your output. As you draw close to Him, His very presence will saturate you with His influence.
c) He will put in you the things that He wants to flow through you.
C) Let’s begin to have that time alone with the Lord.
1) God wants to USE YOU. He wants to FLOW THROUGH YOU. And He wants to BLESS YOU and MOVE IN YOUR LIVES, but it’s going to take that commitment on our part to press in to know Him. That’s when WE’LL BEGIN TO TRUST HIM AND RELY ON HIM like never before. And that’s when we’re to see the power of God moving in our lives. . As we press on to know Him in a greater way, His ways will become our ways. We should be taking on His character, and become more and more in His likeness.
II) HOSEA 10:12.
A) There are 2 kinds of Christian lives: the FOLLOW, and the PLOWED.
1) Follow ground is uncultivated, unused, idle, and dormant.
a) It’s possible that it was plowed at one time, but because it remained untended, it hardened and became crusted until finally it needed to be broken up again in order to receive seed.
2) In the same way, the follow life Christian is content with whatever fruit he may have produced in the past.
a) He is tolerant of those that are seeking God 1st. But he is unmotivated.
(i) He always complains about how things are and how things should be, BUT DOES NOTHING TO MAKE THING BETTER.
b) This is the person that has lost his passion for the presence of God in his life.
(i) He looks back with satisfaction at the glory that once was.
(ii) Yet, he lost that something on the inside of him that causes him to go on and press on with the things of God.
B) The PLOWED LIFE is the life that has remained prepared for the fresh activity of the Holy Spirit.
1) They are not content with INACTIVITY; they want to continue going on in the things of God.
a) The plowed life Christian is the Christian that yearns to be cultivated and developed in order to receive seed again and again.
b) He sees that he is to be A HABITATION OF SEEDS.
(i) Without the proper environment, seed cannot grow. The miracle of growth can only happen in cultivated ground.
2) God’s Word is seed. And with the Holy Spirit cultivating our lives, that cultivation produces the proper environment for that seed to grow.
a) All of God’s Words contain the power necessary to cause them to bear fruit in your life.
b) But they need the proper environment and cultivation to grow, which is brought by the Holy Spirit.
3) When you plant a flower seed in the ground, the color of its bloom, the size of the pedal, everything about that flower is contained in that seed.
a) It’s the same thing with God’s Word.
(i) The seed might be, “By Jesus stripes you are healed.”
(ii) Within that seed contains the full manifestation of that seed.
III) The LIVING BIBLE says, “Plow the hard ground of your hearts.” Only the life that is plowed and cultivated with the Holy Spirit and the presence of God is eligible to see the miraculous groweth of God’s seed. (The promises found in God's Word.)
A) Diligently seeking Him is the open door to breaking up the hardened, unusable ground, and unproductive ground in your life.
1) Listen to what the MOFFATT’S TRANSLATION says of our text, (HOSEA 10:12) “Break up your fallow ground, by seeking knowledge of the eternal.”
a) The way you break up that fallow, uncultivated, unproductive land is by getting to know the Father.
2) The word “SEEKING” from the Moffatt’s translation or from the KJV “Seek the Lord.” The Strong’s concordance says it means “SPECIFICALLY TO WORSHIP.”
a) If you want to break up that unproductive ground in your life, spend time in God’s presence, especially worshipping Him.
3) The last phrase of this verse says “Till he come and rain righteousness upon you.”
a) The Word “RIGHTEOUSNESS” can also mean, “DELIVERANCE, VICTORY, OR PROSPERITY.”
b) Seek the Lord and keep seeking Him until you receive your deliverance, victory, or prosperity.
B) Turn with me to PSA 42:1–2.
1) There is a longing and a yearning of your inner man to know God and His ways more intimately.
2) (PSA 63:1–2 Says from the AMP) “Oh God, you are my God; earnestly will I seek you, my inner self thirsts for you, my flesh longs and is faint for you, in a dry and weary land, where no water is; (2) So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, to see Your power and Your glory.”
a) ¿How far are you willing to go to quench the thirst that is with in you?
(i) Some people are just not determined enough to seek Him.
b) Those who are willing to seek God till He comes and rains righteousness upon them will experience the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in a new dimension.
c) The more deeply you yearn for God to pour Himself through you, the more deeply He will cultivate you.
(i) Fruitfulness is always preceded by cultivation. Seek Him until you experience the rain.
(ii) Then you’ll truly be able to give testimony to what it says in (MATT 6:33) “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”
WOLCC Sun AM 4/5/92 and W. O. L. C. C. Sunday, May 30, 1999