GLORY IN HIS PRESENCE

A daily devotional moment by Chris Garcia

Romans 12:1–2 (NKJV): I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.  And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

The natural glory of God is found in the knowledge of God. The glory you seek is found in knowing Him. There is a difference between an, outward visitation and an inward habitation. If you pay attention to your walk with the Lord, understanding that He lives in, the inside of you. That He dwells on the inside of you. Then you won’t live from the expectations of going from visitation to visitation. Because you will have the habitation. The indisputable feeling and knowing that He is with you always. Many Christians go from visitation to visitation from one encounter to the next encounter. God wants you to go from habitation. Habitually abiding in the glory of God. The Gory of God may not always be sensed or felt, It is a profound knowing at your core a belief found in faith not a dependency on an experience or encounter. Just one of a simple faithful and trusted knowing. The glory of God is to know Him. The scripture says that “Israel knew God's power but Moses knew God's ways.” Moses recognized the glory of God while the children of Israel only recognized the cloud and the fire. If you learn to fellowship with God to know Him you will experience Him. But if you go to Him to experience or to feel, outside of your desire to know Him as an intimate lover of your soul, then you will miss Him every time. While the children of Israel were in awe of the cloud and the fire, that they visibly saw and felt, Moses was moved by the glory that was on the inside of the Tabernacle. What did they do on the inside of the tabernacle? They performed sacrifices. They performed libations and offerings. The priest would daily perform sacrifices in repentance. Now why is that important? The New Testament Roman 12:1-2 says, “Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable act of worship.” It is your worship. In Amos, it says, that the messiah will rebuild the fallen tabernacle of David. Do you understand what that means? It means praise. David was a man of praise and worship. In the book of Hebrews, it says, “Let us, therefore, offer out of the fruit of your lips sacrifice of praise.” Jesus is the sacrifice but we provide our bodies daily. You see there is only one sacrifice and it is only Christ. But then the Holy Spirit urges you, in Romans 12: 1-2 to “present your bodies a living sacrifice” Jesus gave you His life. You know give Jesus your life daily. The sacrifice is your praise, your devotion, and your worship of God. This is to know His ways.

I need to hone in on this because I sense to teach this specific attribute of prayer. We pray often, many times to feel God. I am not against feeling the presence of God as we do experience this in our fresh oil worship Time. I am not against feeling the presence of God but you can not live by feeling in God. Because if you do. You will become fickle. You will become unstable. You will become led by your personal feelings and not faith. You see we live by faith and not by sight. Once you live in faith, you begin to see. Faith is the doorway to truly experiencing Him. Many times we try to go through the doorway of our feelings. We don’t feel Him so therefore we feel that He does not love us. When we don’t feel Him we then feel that we must have done something wrong. We then go through the wrong door. Faith is the doorway to the glory of God. Let me show you a mystery. I sense the presence of God every day. Does that mean that God loves me more than you? Does that mean that God has a special relationship with me that He doesn’t have with you? No! It just means that I have learned to go through the correct door. I learned throughout the years that the door of faith is the entrance to see Him. Every day I sense the presence of God. Every day when I spend time with God, I sense Him immediately. I sense a strong tangible touch. But that is not because I have some special relationship. You have the exact relationship that I do with the Lord. I just learn to go through the right door. In those times when I don’t feel or perceive, I never let that discourage me. Why? Because I am patiently and faithful waiting on Him. You see the immature Christian will do this. They sit waiting on the Lord but then impatience sets in. They think about I got to do this or I have got to do that. Alright, let me put some worship music on, now get comfortable, no that's not comfortable let me sit this way or that way. Ok, now ready, and while sitting "trying" to feel and sense, at that moment, ok God is not here. Let me read the Bible then, then they shift to rushing through speaking in tongues while we are trying to work ourselves up into a religious frenzy. In that entire time of "doing" all that we end up leaving our prayer closet without touching Him. Untouched by God. We never touched Him and He never touched us. Because we were the center of our attention. We, unfortunately, were more aware of our presence than His.

The mature believer does this. Well, I don’t feel Him. They then resolve in their minds, well that is ok it must be me. Let me silence myself. The mature Christian will say, ok let me read a portion of scripture that will help me quiet my soul. Ok, I am here. I wait on you, Lord. I worship you. Then there is a little thought that says, “You are not feeling anything.” You then repeat in your mind or out loud in faith. “I am here because I know you are here Lord and I love you. I worship you.” Another intrusive thought says, “Yeah but you are not feeling,,,” You then return to, “I worship you. You are here. I am not moved by my feelings I am moved by whom I believe in.” In that process and in that wrestling match I let go and I begin to give Him praise. Sometimes I just sit there. I intend to simply be with God because I love Him. I intend to simply become more aware of Him and less of me. Being with the Lord. I am not trying to look for something He can give me. I am simply paying attention to His face. His presence. Loving on Him. Becoming more desiring to be with God. What then begins to happen is that you begin to enjoy the simplicity of your relationship with God. You will find yourself delighting in God. Just enjoying the moments with Him. Instead of going from “trying” and "doings" to feeling Him, you are now there simply enjoying God. Parsing Him and His presence begins to become palpable and tangible to you. Some days it may not be as intense and other days it is. We are led by His ways not His power. If you learn to wait on the presence of God you will "have" the presence of God there with you.

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