Recently I have been using Oswald Chamber’s book My Utmost for His Highest as a part of my daily time with the Lord. If you’ve never used this before, I highly recommend it. [hint: you might be best served by getting the “updated edition in today’s language” – it is easier to understand. However expect to find deep devotional thoughts in his writings.] In June 2nd’s devotional I was truly brought under conviction by the Lord.
Psalm 25:12 is shared as the key verse, “Who is the man that fears the Lord?” Then brother Chambers asks this question, “Are you obsessed by something”. My initial reaction was, “No, not really”. He then goes on to say, “all of us are obsessed by something – usually by ourselves, or, if we are Christians, by our own experience of the Christian life.” Further he points to the fact that the psalmist emphasizes we are to be obsessed by God. “Our abiding awareness of the Christian life,” Chambers says, “is to be God Himself, not just thoughts about Him.”
OUCH – this preacher, who preaches similar truths, finds myself not fully living this idea of “being obsessed with God”. How about you? After all the Lord has done on my behalf – taking my hell and guaranteeing me heaven as a part of His continual mercy and grace poured out upon my life – I’m not constantly obsessed with Him. How awful! I hope you are doing a better job of centering your whole – every part, every situation, every decision, and every action – around the Lord than I have been. God gets partial attention from me and not total captivation. After Jesus gave His all for me on Calvary and the Holy Spirit gives His all every day in seeking to make me like Jesus, I choose not to give my all in putting Him “front and center” in my life 24/7. Forgive me Lord. Pray for me brother or sister. I do want to be one of those men that fears the Lord and that is totally enthralled with Him.
Chambers continues by saying, “If we are obsessed by God, nothing else can get into our lives – not concerns, not tribulation, not worries…To be obsessed by God is to have an effective barricade against all the assaults of the enemy.” Are you like me, often beat up by the world, the flesh, and the devil because Christ doesn’t occupy the throne of my life at all times? You know if I sought to dive in the ocean and go down and down, the pressure would soon squish me to death. Ah, but in a submarine, which equalizes the pressure, I would be able to dive to deeper depths. Christ at the center of my life will always more than equalize the pressure Satan exerts on my life. The psalmist says, “God is our refuge” [Psalm 46:1]. Nothing can break through His shelter of protection.
Why isn’t God your obsession? I’m struggling with that question for my life. Let’s struggle together with this important issue. As Chambers says, “The total being of our life inside and out is to be absolutely obsessed by the presence of God.” Paul the apostle said it this way, we are to “live and move and have our being” in God [Acts 17:28]. Well, I’ve not reached that abiding condition, but I surely do want to. Isn’t it worth giving more Holy Spirit directed effort to?
Wanting to be totally preoccupied with Jesus,
Pastor Steve