"The most portentous fact about any man is not what he at a given time may say or do, but what he in his deep heart conceives God to be like." ~A.W. Tozer
If you were to ask me what the over-arching theme of this summer's walk with Jesus was for me, I would say it was the realization of who He is and why I follow Him.
At the Desperation Conference this year, I found myself struggling to "connect" during worship. While everyone else was experiencing some of the purest encounters with God they had ever had, I "just didn't feel it."
God doesn't want me faking praise, I thought. So I'll just wait to truly connect until I really feel like it. That way I'm not trying to look like I'm having this great worship moment while inside I am feeling dry and still waiting to experience God.
And I would pray. Pray for a powerful revelation from God that would spur me on to a meaningful worship time.
But worship session after worship session, no inspiration would come. I engaged, but not at the level I usually would. But trying to do anything more when I didn't feel like it seemed so artificial. How could that be pleasing to God?
Then I attended a talk by Aaron Stern, the college and 20-somethings pastor at New Life. He began by pointing out our tendency to look at God as something less than He is. We all have a way of understanding God, Stern explained, it just doesn't ever do Him justice.
He then proceeded to take an in-depth look at the beginning of Genesis 1:1, which says,
"In the beginning God created the heavens..."
He showed us photo after photo of glorious star clusters, galaxies, and nebulae. When you look at the sheer size of the work of God's hands, it really does force you to look at Him with a whole new sense of awe. Don't believe me? Check this out:
http://www.postimage.org/image.php?v=gx1G8GWS
WOW. Every time I look at that, and believe me when I say it's been at least 15 times, I wonder who the heck I think I am. It forces me to turn to the Psalms and say with King David,
"I look up at your macro-skies, dark and enormous,
your handmade sky-jewelry,
Moon and stars mounted in their settings.
Then I look at myself and wonder,
Why do you bother with us?
Why take a second look our way?"
~(Psalm 8:3-4, The Message)
By the end of Stern's talk, I was floored. Suddenly, I realized what was wrong. I was expecting the Almighty God, Yahweh, to conform to my momentary feelings and emotions. I was asking Him to cater to me.
In essence, I had been telling Him that He needed to earn my praise.
Even as I sat typing that last sentence, I put my head in my hands and laughed at my idiocy... "I look at my self and wonder... Why do you bother with me? Why do you take a second look my way?"
God never promised that we'll always feel like worshipping Him.
Yet in the moments where I can't feel His presence, I don't sense His goodness, I feel surrounded by my enemies, or simply can't see past my circumstances, I want to be able to say, "This may be my situation, but You are worthy."
In a worship session following Aaron Stern's talk, Phil Wickham sang his song called "I'll Always Love You." As we came to the chorus, I sang with deep conviction, knowing that regardless of what my emotions may tell me, that something had been decided in me that day.
"Forever I will tell You,
Yeah, I'll scream until it hurts,
That I can't live without You,
You are Heaven, I am Earth.
And even from the moment
That You saved my life I knew,
That I would always love You."
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