Dwelling In God's Secret Place

Dwelling in God’s Secret Place

Sunday, January 24, 2010 A.M.

By Pastor James May

Have you ever had your own little secret place; a place where you could go to get away from it all; a place where you could be alone with your thoughts? Little children often find such a place where they can feel secure. Sometimes it’s a tree house, hidden among the limbs and leaves, where you can pull up the rope or the ladder and nobody else can get in. When I was a kid, I used to carve out trails and build a secret place right in the middle of a briar patch, then throw briars over the entrance after I was inside. I can remember spending a lot of time in briar patches just talking to God and thinking about things. Some of you might have had your secret place in a closet, or just a spot in the woods where you could be alone. We live in such a fast paced and demanding world that we all need a secret place now and then, where we can get alone with our thoughts; and alone with God.

The bible tells us that we all need that “secret place”. Jesus was teaching his disciples about prayer when he said in, Matthew 6:6, "But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly." This closet represents our little secret place; a place where we can get alone with God in prayer.

That “Prayer Closet” can be anywhere. It can be a certain stump or log in the woods, or just a long walk in the open field. For a lot of people its behind the steering wheel of a car, or when you are lying awake in the early hours of the morning, perhaps kneeling beside your bed. Wherever it is, and however you do it, you must have a prayer closet, for there is where you learn to commune with God on a very personal level.

Psalms 91:1 tells us that there is great value in having that secret place with God, "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty."

In the days of King David, when this Psalm was written, there was a very special secret place where a man could truly be alone with God. There were very few that ever found that place, or were able to enter in. It was called the Holy of Holies in the Tabernacle, or the Temple and it was a place where a man could be in very presence of El Shaddai, “God Almighty; The All Sufficient One”. It was a place where the glory and majesty of God shone forth in its greatest manifestation on earth. It was the very center of God’s presence among men. What an awesome experience that must have been; to stand before the Ark of the Covenant; to look upon the brightness of His glory; and to see the very glory of God as it shone upon the Mercy Seat between the Cherubims! That was the ultimate in secret places. The first one to enter into that place was Moses and after him only the High Priest of Israel on very special occasions could enter there.

The great thing about this secret place with God is that now every Born Again Blood Washed Child of God can enter into that place with God. We all have access to the Holy of Holies where we can be alone with God.

What is this secret place in God? It is in the very heart of God; in the center of his love, his mercy, his grace and His will. It is into this place that we are brought by the power of the Holy Spirit and the Blood of the Lamb. No one can enter there except through the blood of Jesus. No one can feel the perfect love of God; no one can comprehend the richness of his grace; and no one can know the very heart of God until we come to that secret place in Him.

This is the place where every one us can dwell if we are willing to pay the price to be there. No half-hearted or lukewarm Christian can dwell in God’s secret place – they’ll never find it while the world is still shining brightly in their eyes. No one who is not Born Again could ever hope to find God’s Secret Place because the power of sin has them blinded to it’s existence and they cannot find the way unless it revealed to them through the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit at the moment of salvation. It is not until the heart of a man is cleansed by the blood of Christ; and his understanding is given the light to see; and his will is surrendered to Christ; that he can begin to know the very heart of God.