SUNDAY SCRIPTURE AND FEATURE AT FROM MY FRONT PORCH TO YOURS

Just a little note before Sunday Scripture. I am being featured today at

FROM MY FRONT PORCH TO YOURS

I'm taking part in a series called

HOW I GOT MY STYLE.

I hope you will visit me at Pamela's today. She has a beautiful blog and I'm sharing new things!

Now it's time for Sunday Scripture...

Are you ever Spiritually dry? Feel far away from God? Don't feel connected to your Heavenly Father?

It's a hard place to be... especially when you are used to feeling God's presence in your life. I think everyone feels like that now and then. I've been going through a "dry spell" recently.

Here is how I am coping... I hope it might help you too...

SPEAK GOD'S TRUTH...

"Feelings" are flighty and deceptive and often not based in truth.

Even though I feel that God is far from me I know not to believe those feelings. Just because we feel a certain way does not make it true!

I saturate my mind with God's truth and don't dwell on my feelings. 

Run to God's word in these times and spend time replacing feelings with the precious truth of God!

"Am I only a God nearby," declares the LORD, "and not a God far away? Can anyone hide in secret places so that I cannot see him?" declares the LORD. "Do not I fill heaven and earth?" declares the LORD.

 Jere  23:23-24

"... I will never leave you or forsake you".  Hebrews 13:5

ASK GOD TO SHOW YOU YOUR SIN

Sometimes there may be good reason that we don't feel close to God. Even though, as Christians, our eternal  salvation is secure, our day-to-day sin clogs up that direct pipeline to our Heavenly Father. Feeling far away from God may be the result of unconfessed sin!

We need to go before the throne of Grace and have a good old honest talk with our Abba!

I had a wonderful Daddy. My dad gave me a marvelous picture of the love and mercy and grace of my Father in Heaven... especially when it came to forgiveness!

Daddy never let me go to sleep with any strife between us.  If I went to bed with any unsettled problems, Daddy would come up to my bedroom... sit on the edge of my bed in the dark... and help me start that process of being forgiven by first apologizing to me and telling me how much he loved me! I still marvel at that. When I was wrong HE would apologize!  Even in my most stubborn teenage years my heart would melt. He found a way to start a loving conversation so I could tell him I was sorry and make things right between us.  I never ever remember waking up angry at my father... not once! 

God is like that too! He waits for us with open arms and a loving heart bigger than the universe! He will not condemn or scold or throw our sins in our faces! He waits and whispers His words of love in our far away hearts! He wants to settle things with us even more than we do!

Ask Him to search your heart, reveal your sin and then be quick to tell God you are sorry! 

"Search me, O God, and know my heart: Try me and know my anxious thoughts: And see if there be any hurtful way in me, And lead me to the everlasting way". Ps 139:23-24

"Create in me a clean heart, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me". Ps 51

THE MAIN THING IS TO KEEP THE MAIN THING THE MAIN THING!

In times that I feel far from God it is often because I have become lazy or too busy to spend time reading and studying God's word, praying, listening to my favorite Christian speakers or reading great Christian books.

I find myself feeling far away when I am spending too much time in front of the tv or computer... or my life gets crazy busy.. or something is bothering me. I tend to let my time with God slip away first! I know better... bad move!!!! These are time I need to be connected!!!!

We need to put and keep God first.  That simple... that true!!!

We need to make God the most important thing in our lives! That simple... that true!

We need to be intentional and diligent about following hard after God!

DON'T STRESS... REST

Desert times (when we are spiritually dry) happen. God loves us and is passionately desires a real and deep relationship with us... even when we cannot feel it!

Rest in the truth His love... and find comfort in His word!

Thankfully, if we seek after God desert times don't last forever!

"Draw near to God and He will draw near to you." James 4: 8

Please know that I am keeping any of you who are feeling that God is far away in my prayers!