Sunday, December 22, 2013

How To Have An Encounter With God

By Harriett Crosby


It's easy to have an encounter with God. Anyone who sincerely seeks the creator of the universe without ulterior motives will be successful. God wants a relationship and is waiting for a surrendered heart and spirit to 'come in and sup with' such a one. Relinquishing the will and the right to sit on the throne of one's own life results in an attitude that can hear God's voice and feel His presence.

When God reveals Himself to you, that's the first and perhaps most important encounter. A person who puts every hope in God's hands and believes that an answer will come is ready to be 'born again' to new life in Jesus Christ. The old life and the old man (human nature) dies when the heart and spirit bow before the Father, and a new, eternal life begins.

You need to confess that you are a sinner, as we all are, and that you cannot save yourself. Ask for His forgiveness and believe that Jesus paid the price for your wrongdoing when He died on the cross. As God raised Jesus up, He will also raise you up to new life as a child of God.

God made man to have a need to believe and to form relationships. Although people substitute almost anything for the Lord's presence, life works best when God and not man is in control. Men act because they want something in return: power, wealth, property, or other things to fill the need they feel but don't necessarily understand. God acts through love, asking only love and obedience in return. The first hours of salvation will be something you'll never forget.

The first encounter may be the sweetest and the most memorable, but it won't be the last. Jesus tells us that He will never leave us or forsake us, and that He will be present through every joy and every trial. His direction and guidance, as well as help, comfort, and healing, will make your life full of miracles and special moments that are more precious than gold.

People who know God have a testimony of answered prayer, intervention in times of stress or danger, or answers to dilemmas. The more people turn to Him and ask, the more He steps forward. He never intrudes - actually, He rarely intrudes. There's the man who, about to leave for the mission field, was telling the Lord that he had married the wrong wife when the Lord roared at him. He surrendered his right to complain, and he and his wife had a fruitful and loving partnership for decades in South American jungles.

Although the Lord will occasionally overpower His children - as the apostle John was knocked on his face by his vision of Jesus - He doesn't invade an un-surrendered life. It is possible to shut the Lord out. He promises to give even unbelievers the air, water, food, and even clothing they need, because God always hopes for a child's return. However, He'll allow a life to be lost for all eternity if that's a person's choice.

An encounter with God should be every person's goal. It's the way to the free gift of salvation and the joy of the Lord that will be your strength as long as you walk with Him.




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