Passion For The Presence
We are talking about pursuing God's presence. We're going to start off by comparing ourselves with Moses, and compare our passion with Moses' passion, and see how we rate.
Let's look at Exodus 33, starting at verse one. "The Lord said to Moses, 'Now that you have brought these people out of Egypt, lead them to the land I solemnly promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I told them long ago that I would give this land to their descendants.'" (So far, so good!) "'And I will send an angel before you to drive out the Canaanites, Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. Theirs is a land flowing with milk and honey. But I will not travel along with you, for you are a stubborn, unruly people. If I did, I would be tempted to destroy you along the way.'" Moses heard that, and said, "That's not good enough. I'm not content with an angel." He told God that this was an unacceptable alternative. And God replied, in verse 14, "I will personally go with you, Moses. I will give you rest and everything will be fine for you." That sounds like a good offer.
(By the way, you see in here one of the effects of having the presence of God -- God gives you rest. Does that sound good? Does anyone here need a nap? "Rest" here, as defined in the Hebrews chapter four, as it talks about "entering into the Lord's rest," means that I cease from my labors, and I rest in God's labors. I cease from my works and I rest in His works. I come to the realization that it's not up to me, it is up to Him. It is God's job to do His job, and I simply rest in His job and His ability to do His job, His power flowing through me. That's what "rest" means.)
So God told Moses, "I'll give you what you need to go through this, and I will be with you." That sounds like a good offer for Moses, at least. But Moses doesn't settle for this. He said No. It was not good enough for Moses to get God, he wanted ALL the people to get God's presence. In the next verse, verse 15, Moses said, "'If You won't go with US personally, don't let us move a step from this place. If You don't go with us, how will anyone ever know that Your people and I have found favor with You? How else will they know we are special and distinct from all other people on the earth?' And the Lord said to Moses, 'I will indeed do what you have asked, for you have found favor with Me, and you are My friend.'"
For a lot of people, that was a good offer. It sounded pretty good. An angel will go before you, he will drive out those people, He will give you the land. In other words, you can have the promises of God without the fullness of His presence. Does God do that? Of course He does, because He is a God who honors His promises. With or without the fullness of the presence, He will fulfill the promises He has made. He said, "I'm not going to hang around with these guys, because I'm going to be tempted to kill them. But I'm going to give you everything I promised, because I promised it to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. I promised it to them, and I am going to keep My word."
In other words, you can experience the blessing of God, the promises of God, without the fullness of His presence. He said, "I'm not going with you, but I'll send an angel." And Moses said, "that's not good enough for me." So Moses refused to budge without God's presence.
Moses was including everyone in his conversation with God; Moses spoke on behalf of everybody. I'm sure if they took a vote, everybody would have said, "Wait a moment, Moses, this isn't a bad deal! We get everything we were promised; we get all the blessings, we get all the goods. So what if we don't get the full measure of His presence; that is OK. We still get the goods!" I think that really depicts a lot of what the church has been like, because we're experiencing the blessings of God, the fullness of the promises He's made to us. However, the fullness of His presence isn't there. And we think, just because we've experienced the benefits of His promises, we think we have the fullness of His presence, and we think it is normal!
I like the way God said to Moses, "You've found favor with Me, and you are My friend. I'll do what you want." Wouldn't you like to have that kind of relationship with God? You talk to God, and He says, "Sure. Whatever you say! You're my friend. You're my buddy." Moses did this because he had a passion for God's presence. It was all about Him. In other words, he was saying, "I am not going into the land if I don't have You, because I can have all of the land, but if I don't have You, I have nothing." He was revealing his motive -- his motive was the Presence. The motive isn't the possession. The motive isn't the blessing. He would not be satisfied with anything less than God's presence.
Who led the people of Israel after Moses? Joshua. What similarities do you find with Joshua and Moses? They both had a passion for His presence. Moses would go spend time with God; the cloud would descend upon Moses in the tabernacle in the wilderness. There was Moses, encountering God. And when the cloud lifted, Moses came out and his face was glowing because he had experienced the glory of the Lord. But who rushed back over to where God was? Joshua. Everybody else was out listening to Moses, but Joshua was running to where God's presence was.
When Moses went up to the mountain, Joshua went with him, and went just as far as he could go. Moses said, "You'd better stop right here." And he went up to the mountain. The one who was right there at the very place at the foot of the mountain was Joshua. And that's who God used, God chose, to lead His people. Why? Because God could trust him; because he wasn't after the possession, he was after the Presence.
Are we getting the correlation? A lot of things that we want, we are asking God for what we want. It might be that God might just give them to us when our wants change, when we're not wanting the benefits of the promise, but we're just wanting the fullness of His presence. Matthew 6:33 says, "Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you." There's a procedure here; there's a process; and there is so much to be gained from His presence.
But not everybody shared Moses' excitement about the presence of the Lord. In fact, the people that he led didn't have the same excitement when God had told Moses to instruct them to get ready for a visitation in Exodus 19:10-13. God's direction to Moses went something like this:
"I want you to get all the people, gather them together, bring them to the edge of the mountain, get ready for this -- prepare themselves for a couple of days and make things right. Then come to the edge of the mountain, and set up a kind of fence, a boundary so they don't cross over, because if they get on the other side I just might kill them, so let's keep them back on this side of it. So they were staying on this side, and He said, 'Because I'm going to reveal Myself, and show My people My Glory.'"
The people were not so excited about God's presence. In fact, they were terrified by it, and asked Moses to act as a go-between for them between God and themselves, lest His presence kill them. But when Moses went up the mountain to meet with the Lord on their behalf, they forgot all of their terror. They forgot their covenant to worship only God and be His people. They got tired of waiting for Moses to return and made an idol, a golden calf. These people were not serious with God, and they provoked Him to anger. That is why God did not want to go with them. But Moses would not accept God's decision and pleaded with Him to change His mind and accompany them. God listened to Moses and agreed to come.
Right after Moses had this encounter with God, you would think that would be enough, right? God said, "OK, I'll go with you; and I'll go with the people." All of us would say, "Hey, that's good enough for me."
Was that good enough for Moses? The answer is, No. It goes on to say this: then Moses had one more request, recorded in Exodus 33:19. "One more thing, God. Oh, by the way, please let Me see your glorious presence."
Let's read on (Exodus 33:20-23):
The Lord replied, "I will make all My goodness pass before you, and I will call out My name 'the Lord' to you. I will show kindness to anyone I choose, and I will show mercy to anyone I choose. But you may not look directly at My face, for no one may see Me and live." The Lord continued, "Stand here on this rock beside Me. As My glorious presence passes by, I will put you in the cleft of the rock and cover you with My hand until I have passed. Then I will remove My hand, and you will see Me from behind. But My face will not be seen." NLT
Moses pushed the envelope. Most of us would have stopped. We would have been satisfied. But he wasn't. God said, "OK, I'll go with you." He said, "Good, but one more thing. I want to see You as much as I can see You." When the Lord said to him, "You may not look directly at Me, for no one may see Me and live," that might have deterred me. I might have said, "OK, well, we don't have to do this." But he pushed in. It's like he did not care, because what pushed him was his pursuit of the Presence. It was who he was. Moses was hungry for God's presence.
What about us? Are we anything close to that hungry for God?
Contentment and God's Glory
Our last lesson looked at Moses' hunger and passion for God. Sadly, the people of Israel who Moses led did not share his excitement. Let's go back to that story in Exodus 19, where God appeared to the people and met with them face to face. He told them to get ready. He brought them to the mountain to meet with God. Exodus 19:16 picks up with them standing at the edge of the mountain ready for this great encounter. Let's read Exodus 19:16-19:
On the morning of the third day, there was a powerful thunder and lightning storm, and a dense cloud came upon the mountain. There was a long, loud blast from a ram's horn, and the people trembled. Moses led them out from the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain. All Mount Sinai was covered with smoke because the LORD had descended on it in the form of fire. The smoke billowed into the sky like smoke from a furnace, and the whole mountain shook with a violent earthquake. As the horn blast grew louder and louder, Moses spoke, and God thundered his reply for all to hear. (NLT)
Now would that create within you a hunger for God? God is on the mountain, they have lightning and thunder, and Moses brings the people over there. He speaks, and all of a sudden it thunders "BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM," and everybody felt it. He turns around to everybody and says, "Whoa! Wasn't that good?!" And what are they doing? He's saying, "Whooh, let's do it again! Let's do it again!" He's up there screaming at God, and God is thundering back, and he's coming back, "Wasn't that great? That was a great day!" -- They weren't quite as excited. Exodus 20:18-19 says:
When the people heard the thunder and the loud blast of the horn, and when they saw the lightning and the smoke billowing from the mountain, they stood at a distance, trembling with fear. And they said to Moses, "You tell us what God says, and we will listen. But don't let God speak directly to us. If he does, we will die!"
In essence they told God, "Don't speak to me directly. Just talk to Moses, and then he can tell us what You are saying." They said that because they were scared of the Presence.
Wouldn't it be true to say that a lot of the church has simply settled for a measure of the glory? A lot of the church waits for other people to experience the glory and to tell you what the glory is like. Is it true that, at least with the Western church that I'm familiar with, that we've only been accustomed to existing in a measure of the glory of God; fall short of what God would like to pour out upon His people and His church (and I'm speaking in general terms here)? Sometimes we get satisfied with a little. We get satisfied with a little bit, because we're still experiencing the benefits of the promise.
You see, when we come into a relationship with Him, we have an inheritance as sons and daughters. We have His righteousness. We have His holiness. We have His victory. These are the things that He gives us as our birthright as sons and daughters of God. We're still overcomers. We can experience many of those blessings because God is a God who keeps His word; and yet still not experience the full measure of His presence.
There is one thing you will find lacking without God's presence. You will not find the measure of power of God without His presence. The formula is: more glory, more power; less glory, less power. We need His power -- the power to walk with Him, the power to overcome sin, the power to hear His voice with clarity, the power to live the victorious Christian life, the power to walk in the miraculous, the power to stand alone for God, the power to share the Gospel with people we come in contact with. We need to experience the power of God, and we need to experience it in its fullness, not in part.
On a passion scale, on the one end would be Moses and Joshua. But on the bottom end would be the "contented Christian." I use that term "contented" to mean you just have all of God that you really want. The truth is, you are as close to God as you want to be. It means, "I'm not looking for any more; what I have is OK. I'm able to get by and go through life with what I have. So I'm content." Contentment becomes the enemy of passion.
God wants to break us out of being contented, and move us into passion. God wants it for all of us, and it's possible for every one of us. That is why it is so important for us to be honest with God. Let's not pull anything over God's eyes, because we're not doing that anyway.
What is a contented Christian? Let me just give you some characteristics of what a contented Christian could be. It could be that you're contented because you are self-focused. It could be that the presence of God is not on your "radar scope;" as you go through life you are not looking for the presence of God. You're not actively pursuing it. You don't get up in the morning and say, "Where's God? What is God doing? How is God involved in my day today?" He's just not on your "radar scope."
Sometimes people say, "Well, if I go after the presence of God, He might mess things up for my life. I've got my life the way I like it. I've got my job; I've got my free time; I've got my hobbies. I have all of this stuff. I've got my life the way I want it, and if I go after His presence, He might mess with that stuff. I like what I have. He might ask me to give some of that up, or give it to Him. So, I like what I have, and I'm not looking for any more."
Maybe your focus is upon your needs, because you're the only one on your "radar scope." Maybe you have your own set of goals and agenda of what you would like to accomplish for your life. Of course you didn't realize that your life doesn't belong to you. It belongs to Someone else. But if I get close to Him, then He's going to let me know that.
What if my goals, and what if my agenda for my life aren't in line with His? It's like going through life avoiding hearing God, tuning God out. Look at your life and look honestly. What are your pursuits, and what are your passions? Just be honest before God. What are your pursuits? Do you have any hobbies that drive you? Maybe it's a job. Maybe it's how you use your spare time. What drives you? What pushes you? When you get up in the morning, what are the things that are on your mind? It may take an hour or two before our brains work, but once it starts functioning, what is on your mind? What are your passions? Look at those things. What drives your life? What gets you through this day and the next day and the next day? What do you look forward to this week? What is your number one driving passion?
Sometimes people are "the Contented Christian" because of withdrawal. They are simply withdrawn. They're content because they don't like getting out of the cave that they've worked so hard to dig. They don't build relationships with other people. In fact, the only relationships that they have are what people build to them. In other words, if you're going to have a relationship with me, you have to work on the bridge from your end.
You say, "Why is that contentment?" Your relationship with people is an indicator of your relationship with God, because if you withdraw from people, I guarantee you are withdrawn from God. When you are with God, God changes your passion. God's presence always changes people. When you get next to Him, and your passion is for Him, He changes you to embrace His passion, and God has a passion for people.
Look at Moses. God said, "OK, I'll go with you." Was that good enough for him? "No," he said, "You've got to go with US." He said that because he had been with God, and because he had God's passion for those people. It changes you. It's a genuine evidence of being in His presence. If you pursue His presence and you find it, God will begin to pour Himself in you, including His love for people and His passion. That stuff will be in you.
Love alters your personality traits. Love overrides a person's introvertedness. You say, "Well, that's not me!" It never is you! It is always how much God is in you. God has a passion for people, and if you are connecting with God and coming into His presence and really encountering Him, then you can't help it. What is in you will flow out to other people, because that is His passion.
Look at the bridges you have built this last couple of years -- where have you built them? Or is your life like, "The only way you're going to have a relationship with me is if you build a bridge to me. That's the only way we're going to have a relationship, is that you've got to work on your bridge." You see, you're on your 'radar scope' but God is not. I hear this all the time: "Nobody at that church likes me. Nobody is extending himself to be my friend." That is because the bridges only go one way. What's the antidote? The Presence.
Look at the scale. Take some time, write down the people you've built a bridge to build a relationship with this year. Fill up the page with the names! Go ahead and write! Let's get real honest here, ok, with just you and God. Be honest because when you get next to Him, all that is passion upon His heart will become passion upon your heart. You will find that you are a giving person because God is a giving God. "God so loved, He gave." He built that bridge. He came down to our level. We didn't have to come up to His. God came down in the flesh. He came down and did what He did, down at our level so that we can relate to Him. That's what love is about. Love is building a bridge to another person.
That's what love is, and if you get next to God, you know what's going to happen to you: His love is going to rub off on you, His passion is going to become your passion, and you won't be able help it. You're going to look around and say, "Who can I love today?" because He's a part of that. That's an effect, that's a fruit of having a passion for the Lord Jesus. So, if you want your personality to get changed, let's pursue the Presence. It's never you anyway, it is always Him. You don't have it in you. But God has all the resources, and He will share them with you as you draw close to Him.
Fear And God's Presence
In our last lesson, we learned that contentment is the enemy of passion for God. Contentment keeps us from pressing in for the full measure of His presence. We already talked a bit about contentment and some of its characteristics, some of the things that can keep us from pursuing the presence of God. There are actually three characteristics, not just two. Let's quickly review the two from the last lesson and then we will move on to the third one.
One of the characteristics that keeps us from pursuing God's presence is when we are preoccupied with ourselves, our own interests and our own agenda instead of embracing God's agenda. The second characteristic is withdrawal, or lack of healthy and godly interactions and relationships with our brothers and sisters in the Lord. We already talked about those things in lesson 3, so let us move on to the last characteristic: fear.
Sometimes we don't press into God's presence because God can be rather scary. Even in His encounter with Moses God said, "You can't look at Me and live." That's a little scary. I mean, the way He manifested to the people -- that was scary. If you look through the Bible, every time that you see somebody encounter an angel and the glory of God was present, what were the first words out of that angel's mouth? "Fear not!" Why do you think he said that? What do you think the person was going through right then?
When Daniel encountered the angel, he encountered the glory of God. Wham! He fell down on his face limp, and he couldn't even move. It was the glory of the Lord. "By the way, don't be afraid!" "That's easy for you to say!" God can be quite scary. One of the reasons is, every time you get next to the glory of God, all of your "stuff" gets exposed. His glory shines right into all your life, and you say, "Ooh, yuck!" Remember Adam and Eve? "Oh! Where are those fig leaves?" Every time you get near the glory, it's like He exposes everything.
What happens when God begins to really manifest His glory in the Church? When God begins to manifest His glory, (and we all feel this, no matter how passionate we are), when God begins to come into the house, there is something going on inside of us that gets exposed. Because the greater measure of the glory, the greater measure of exposure. For a lot of people, they come into the house, maybe here for the first or second time, all of a sudden the glory of the Lord fills the room, and they say, "Get me out of here! What was that?" It was the Presence! Each time I come into His tangible presence, it feels like I never experienced it before! I just feel like I'm naked when I'm in that place, so I want to get out of there. I feel uncomfortable.
Any time you encounter God, you're going to feel a bit uncomfortable. That is OK because God is a God of love. He already sees everything anyway. He knows everything there is to know. Nothing is hidden from His sight, and He loves you perfectly. You say, "Ok, just unravel me!" That is sort of what He does; He exposes those inner issues to you. And that's where we say, "Oh-unh -- I don't want to see it!"
Yes, His presence can be very frightening. It's a fear of being humbled, it's a fear of what He might ask me to do. "He might want me to go be a missionary to China or some place, and I don't know how I'm going to build my 401K if He does that. He might actually require it, and then what am I going to do? Oh, my!"
Sometimes there is a fear of failure of not being able to live up to God's expectations. Moses encountered all of those. But he still pursued the Presence. Joshua encountered all of those and he pursued the Presence. If you want to know Joshua's success, here it is: Joshua 1:5 "No man will be able to stand before you all the days of your life, just as I have been with Moses, I will be with you. I will not fail you nor forsake you." Joshua had a passion for the Presence.
One of the tribes of Manasseh said this, "We ourselves will cross over armed in the presence of the Lord into the land of Canaan." I love that phrase: 'armed with the presence of God.'
What was the secret to David's success? David was the man who had a heart after God. Here it is, Psalm 42, verses one and two: "As the deer pants for the water brooks, so my soul pants for Thee, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?" Just read the Psalms, because God's presence is all over the Psalms. Psalm 16:11 says, "Thou will make known to me the paths of light. In Thy presence is fullness of joy. In Thy right hand there are pleasures forever." In this verse here, what's in the presence of God? Fullness of joy. Does anybody have a 'joy deficiency' every once in a while? Does anybody have all the joy that you'll every need? Anybody need a little more from time to time? Where do you get it? Right in His presence.
Let me give you another verse relating to that joy. It's found in Isaiah 9:3, "Thou shalt multiply the nation. Thou shalt increase their gladness. They will be glad in Thy presence, as the gladness of harvest, as men rejoice when they divide the spoil." He is saying that the only thing he can compare that joy to is like when you've already brought in all the crops, the work is done, the barns are full, and you have the harvest, and how does that feel? They would have parties. they would have big celebrations when the harvest was over and they were done with the work of bringing it all int othe storehouses.
Or it's like you've gone out to battle, you've won the battle, and now you are going out and picking up the spoil. Are you going to say, "Oh, I just don't want to do that! I just can't believe they're making me -- No!" These guys are excited. They're yelling, "Whooh! Look what we have here! Look what I found here! It's a cot. I've never seen one of these before." They are excited about this stuff. That comes from the Presence.
Joy comes from His Presence. Psalm 44:3 says, "By their own sword they did not possess the land, and their own arm did not save them, but Thy right hand, Thine arm and the light of Thy presence, for Thou didst favor them." It wasn't you -- it was God. He was with them, and because He was with them, they had victory.
What was David's greatest fear? When David sinned against Bathsheba and he cried out to God repenting, he said in Psalm 51:11, "Do not cast me away from Thy presence. Do not take Thy Holy Spirit from me." His biggest fear was that God would remove His presence. Is that your biggest fear? Is that the biggest caution in your life, that you don't want to do anything to remove His presence? Is that a driving force in your life?
Hebrews 11:6 says, "Without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him." What does God do for those who seek Him? There is a cause and effect here. You just seek Him, because everything comes from His presence. Joy comes from His presence. Provision comes from His presence (Isaiah 23:18). Victory comes from His presence. Life comes from His presence. Everything comes from His presence.
That's why I want you to get that Passion Scale, and look at it. Ask yourself, "Where am I on the scale? Where do I want to be?" I have to look at myself and say, "Am I content? Am I content with what I have? Am I content with the measure of the glory of God that I'm possessing now? Am I willing to go day after day saying I'm ok with what I have? I'm not pursuing or going after any more." It's like, "I know that I should, but I'm really not, and so I'm just content with this."
If you are content with where you are, is it because you are focused on yourself? Is it because you're withdrawn? Is it because of fear? In other words, what's keeping you from having a passion after God? Maybe your cry today is, "God it's not there, but I want it. God, I want your passion! I want it!" Because the truth is, you are as close to God as you want to be.
Proverbs 8:17 says, "I love those who love me; those who diligently seek Me will find Me." Can God be found? Yes. God always finds those who are looking for Him. Just look in Acts chapter 10, the story of Cornelius. He was looking for God, so God sent Peter. God gave Peter a dream or vision, orchestrated just to go talk to Cornelius, because he was a man who was looking for God. He was diligently seeking after God. If you are going after God, He'll make sure you find Him.
When we speak about destiny, one of the verses we frequently quote is Jeremiah 29:11, "'I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans for prosperity and not calamity, to give you a future and a hope.'" That verse speaks of destiny. Verse 12 says, "'Then you will call upon Me, and come and pray to Me, and I'll listen to you. And you will seek Me, and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. And I will be found by you,' declares the Lord, 'and I'll restore your fortunes, and will gather you from the nations, and from all the places I have driven you,' declares the Lord. 'And I will bring you back to the place from where I sent you into exile.'"
If you're looking for God, you'll find Him. If your 'passion factor' is high, if you're pursuing the Lord with great passion, you'll find Him.
Let me give you one more verse. Psalm 14:2 says this, "The Lord has looked down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God." God is looking down from heaven on the sons of men. He's looking for people who seek after Him. When God looks down from heaven -- is He looking for you?
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