Geplaatst:21 apr 2006 08:52 - Gewijzigd: 21 apr 2006 08:52

Come before God

„Wherewith shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before the high God?”

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Micah 6:6

Wherewith shall I come before the Lord? An unawakened man never puts that question. A natural man has no desire to come before God, or to bow himself before the High God. He does not like to think of God. He would rather think of any other subject. He easily forgets what he is told about God. A natural man has no memory for divine things, because he has no heart for them. He has no desire to come before God in prayer. There is nothing a natural man hates more than prayer. He would far rather spend half an hour every morning in bodily exercise or in hard labour, than in the presence of God.

He has no desire to come before God when he dies. He knows that he must appear before God, but it gives him no joy. He had rather sink into nothing; he had rather never see the face of God. Ah! my friends, is this your condition? How surely you may know that you have „the carnal mind which is enmity against God.” You are like Pharaoh: „Who is the Lord, that I should obey Him?” You say to God: „Depart from me, for I desire not the knowledge of Thy ways.” What an awful state it is to be in to have no desire after Him who is the fountain of living waters!

An awakened soul feels that his chief happiness is in coming before God. This was unfallen Adam’s happiness. He felt like a child under a loving Father’s eye. It was his chief joy to come before God, to be loved by Him, to be like a mote in the sunbeam, to be continually basked in the sunshine of His love, no cloud or veil coming between.

This is the joy of holy angels, to come before the Lord, and bow before the High God. In His presence is fulness of joy. „The angels do always behold the face of My Father.” On whatever errand of love they fly, they still feel that His eye of love is on them; this is their daily, hourly joy.

This is the true happiness of a believer. Hear David: „As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after Thee, O God: my soul thirsteth for God, for the living God: when shall I come and appear before God?” He panteth not after the gifts of God, not His favours or comforts, but after Himself. A believer longs after God, to come into His presence, to feel His love, to feel near to Him in secret, to feel in the crowd that he is nearer than all the creatures.

Ah! dear brethren, have you ever tasted this blessedness? There is greater rest and solace to be found in the presence of God for one hour, than in an eternity of the presence of man. To be in His presence, under His love, under His eye, is heaven, wherever it be. God can make you happy in any circumstances. Without Him, nothing can.

Robert Murray McCheyne (1813-1843), minister in Dundee, Scotland