How much
do you really desire communion with God? By communion is meant how much do you
run with great eagerness to be found talking with God or knowing that you are
constantly in his presence in everything you do.
By way
of example, a boy after school would often run home to commune with his PlayStation,
or a person who loves money will joyfully commune with businesses in order to
gain more money. In our day many of us commune with technology. At first
sunrise we check our emails, before our eyes shut we linger on the internet.
Many of
us have friends whom we are eager and desperate to commune with that we constantly
make it our business to engage with them because we have some pleasure in communing
with them. Those who are in love know of the deep longing of communion and how
sweet and satisfying that communion is when had. One lover cannot wait until he
has returned into his beloved's arms and the other waits with longing for her
beloved to be in sight as to run and greet them with a wet kiss.
My
friends, When was the last time that joy overwhelmed your soul that you ran,
leaving all in order to meet your Heavenly Father, His Son and the Holy Spirit?
When was the last time your sleeping heart ached for the morning because you
long to worship your beloved God? When was the last time you finished work, and
desired to run into your room, closing all the windows and blinds in order to
enjoy, delight and commune with God?
It seems
to me that Communion with God is acted upon when our hearts are filled with
care, but when they are empty of the fevers of life, how many are found to
commune with God for pleasure and happiness?
This is
one reason I think that the prayer rooms are often empty or poorly attended. Therefore
it will not surprise me if a great portion of those who confess fellowship with
God have left off constant communion with God. The three reasons why I think
this is so is three fold.
1. People who confess to be in fellowship with God
are now out of love with God.
2. They have no real sense on the importance of
constant communion in order for the growth of their faith.
3. They do not see
that it is in communion with God can they have their true happiness. There are
more reasons that can be submitted but these for now will suffice.
These
who are out of love with God are those who have forgotten their first love.
They have simply forgotten the freshness and fragrance of Christ atoning
sacrifice, the depths of the Father’s love and the Spirit’s desire to
distribute to them the comfort of his nature. They have lost sight of the
amazing goodness of God as given to them in the gospel, they have forgotten his
heart for them. They have not remembered the words of Christ, that the Father
loves them and his disposition towards them his good. They have forgotten that
greeting which always comes favourable to them in the words of grace and peace
and even so, in a greater degree they have forgotten that God desires
fellowship with them and that He wants to make their home with them. "If
anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will
come to him and make our home with him.” John 14:23. They have also forgotten
the words, "In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and
I in you". They have not remembered that Christ promised not to leave them as
orphans. They have forgotten that Christ is constantly knocking upon the doors
of their hearts saying each morning will you not let me in so that you may have
your heart in mine and we can dine together.
O sluggish saint, I beg you to arise from your sleep and
come running into communion with your God. He loves you, He desires you and
will you not want to commune with him. Will you pass by the abundant feast he
has prepared for you? Will you continue to neglect him, for if you do, then
fear, that perhaps you truly do not have any love for him. O awaken your love,
remind yourself why you first loved him. Have him again in your sights and
return to your first love.
2 They have no real sense on the importance of
constant communion in order for the growth of their faith. Those that have no
real sense in communion with God in order for the maturity of their faith will
neglect communion with God for other religious duties. Their ways will be
pragmatic, too much time in prayer will be seen as energy wasted, and although
they deny this in speech yet their practise speaks loudly. They have not yet
understood that communion with God is the real source of power and that which
causes lasting fruit. Remain in me and I will remain in you says our Lord. We
are to remain in communion with him, we are not to desert him for practical
means.
It was
our Lord who said, Joh 15:4, Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by
itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.
This text
exhorts us to cleave to Christ with all of our heart and soul. An infant cannot
satisfy his thirst unless his parents gives it to him, likewise no saint will
bear fruit unless they continue to abide in Christ, unless they continue to
commune with Christ. Communion is at the heart of procuring fruit in Christ’s
Kingdom. Those who have left off this holy delight are those who soon have no
real sense of the presence of Christ in their ministry. All of their works is
decorated in human wisdom.
If you
desire for your faith to yield that 100 fold which our Lord speaks of, then
commune with him. Seek him with all of your heart. Consider him your daily
treasure. Make him the satisfaction of all of your hunger and thirst. Be found
constantly in his presence then those fruits of righteousness will grow
abundantly and beautifully in you.
3. And
thirdly there are those who have not yet understood that true happiness is
found in communion with God. It is a Christian truth that mankind was made for
God and to enjoy him forever. The picture we get of the duty of the saints in
all eternity is worship. They will be delighting in God forever. To commune
with God is to be truly satisfied with God regardless of our condition. When we
bring our sorrowful petitions to him, is not the end of our petitions for him
to comfort us and set peace in our hearts? Is not the end of our prayers ultimately
to say your will be done O Lord. And is there not ultimately pleasure and happiness
at the right hand of God? Those who have lingered much in communion can say,
that it is in those moments when they have so experienced God as vivid and full
in their hearts they did encounter their deepest joy of happiness and
satisfaction. Nothing else can compare to it. But if one is not sensible of the
deep happiness contained in this communion with God, then one will not so
desire to run towards it. We were made to be happy and this desire is to have
its end in God. He is the source of all pleasures; and if we are wise then we
will indeed hate our relationships with other things and run to Him as fast as
we can for our happiness.
Christ
often communed with his disciples with words. He said in Joh 15:11, "These
things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may
be full". These are strange words as one commentator writes, that one about to
be crucified should speak of his joy! His joy was union with and
presence of the Father. He had "anointed him with the oil of gladness
above his fellows." He desired his disciples to have that joy, the
constant consolation of the sense of the presence of Christ.
O come and speak to Christ, Come and speak also to his
Father. They have spoken to you so that your joy may be full. O come into the
conversation, come into the fellowship to which you were made for. O come into
the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. Come and be sensible as to have your heart
indulged in pleasure; for as well as the end of the words he spoke was all to
the praise of his glory yet it is also that his joy may be in you and that your
joy may be full. I know that you want fullness of Joy, so come now and linger
much in communion with your Heavenly Father.
To add
these last few words as to promote no misunderstandings, that of course, to
commune with God can be done in various places (in churches, with believers,
and etc.) and can be done constantly in the soul. I believe that we can carry God
in our souls, being ever so mindful of his presence at all times that no matter
where we are, we can be sure that He is there with us. And an acknowledgement
of this basic fact will indeed free you to lift up holy hands or quietly,
amidst a crowd of people speaking to your beloved God in the joy of your soul.
And
there is that quiet place. That place of intimacy. That bed of matrimony which
only a husband and a wife share and there, they commune so deeply that none knows
the pleasure of it except them who engaged in such holy acts. Likewise, there
is that place, that heaven of paradise where one ought to visit often, making
sure that it is only them and their Creator; and then with great humbling
energy place themselves upon his loving arms and speak to him the desires of
their soul. There he would listen and speak in return to you, comforting you
and flushing you with the joy that is much contained in him.
Communion
demands perseverance. Communion demands a willingness to stay beyond the discipline,
until the sunshine is poured into the soul. O to commune with God is infinitely
better than to commune with anyone else. And what shame that many of us have
forsaking such a happy engagement. O now, will you not shut your eyes, will you
not forsake the world’s pleasures of your heart and seek heavenly communion
with your God? O pursue communion, have him in your heart. Love him with magnificence
and you shall see your soul warmth and caressed with sovereign joy.
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