“…but because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. Therefore, He is able to save completely those who come to God through Him, because He always lives to intercede for them.”  Hebrews 7:24-25

As if it weren’t enough that Jesus gave up all the benefits of heaven, came to earth and lived in the flesh as a mere man with weaknesses and temptations and struggles, then suffered a cruel, tortuous death for us, He still intercedes for us. Can anyone fathom a love so great?
As a Christian, I have the power of God Himself within me, the same power that created the galaxies and black holes and that raised Jesus from the dead, so there’s no question about whether I possess the power to overcome sin in my life. And yet I sin. I choose to sin. How can I do this knowing how much God loves me and wants a close relationship with me?
How could a couple of glasses of wine seem more important than that treasured relationship? How can spending time on Facebook seem more important? And yet, many time I do let those things take a place in my life ahead of spending time with the Creator of the Universe.

No wonder God compares us to sheep, very dumb creatures indeed.

I don’t understand how I can go through a time of longing for, and praying for, a closer relationship with God, only to follow it with an entire week of not bowing my knee one time in communion with Him.
But I do.

To catch up a little (can’t believe it’s been 4 months since I’ve posted!), God has been teaching me about prayer. And there’s nothing more exciting than to hear from God.  Back in April, during my women’s Bible study, we discussed setting up our “fat files.” These would be spiritual things about which we desired to become more knowledgeable. I went home and thought about it for a while. At one point it hit me – duh! Prayer. How many times had I felt inadequate to properly pray for certain situations and had asked God to teach me to pray. So I set up a fat file on prayer.

As I studied the Bible and other resources about this topic, I also cleaned out our spare bedroom, which served as our school room, and my craft room and sewing room, etc. I decided to turn it into my prayer room. I hauled a lot of stuff out and rearranged everything. I printed and framed a couple of Bible verses that I wanted to be praying for certain people and hung them on the wall where I could see them easily. Those verses were Ephesians 1:15-21 and Ephesians 3:14-21.

Fast forward a couple of months: in June I received my online devotional and it contained two of the verses that I’ve been praying regularly. I recorded it in my prayer journal as “It’s like God reached down from heaven and handed me a letter – a confirmation that He’s hearing me and guiding me into His truth!” There was a little more to it, but it was very exciting.

In July, my prayer partner was at a Bible meeting, and one of the ladies there spoke these same verses to Kerri – she’s one of the people I’ve been praying these verses for, so we were both very excited about it.
August was an incredible month for hearing from God. One week I was reading our workbook for Sunday School and incredibly, the verses were Ephesians 1:15-23, and THEN Jim did the Bible reading before the church service that very day, and he read Ephesians 1:15-2:10. Unbelievable!  But it doesn’t stop there. A couple weeks later our previous pastor was filling in while our current pastor was out of town.  During Sunday School he quoted a verse from this passage in Ephesians again, and when he delivered the message for the Sunday Service, the whole message was about how to pray for our church. And yes, he read Ephesians 1:15-21 as Paul’s example of how to pray for other believers.

Can there be ANYTHING more exciting than knowing that God is speaking to you?  He had been revealing to me not only how to pray for my sisters in Christ (and other believers) but also about His power, over and over and over. So what happened? I disobeyed God, and I’m having a hard time feeling like I’m worthy of His forgiveness. No, that’s not quite right. I guess I’m just struggling with the thought that I can love Him and desire closeness with Him, and then turn around and disobey. What does that say about my love for Him?

So even though it’s been almost two weeks since my disobedience, I still feel so far from Him. It became all too easy to get busy this week, and I didn’t spend a single morning with Him.
It all scares me a little.