Living In His Presence

Living in His presence

Deuteronomy 30:11-20

Introduction-

Last week, we looked at worship. What worship looks like and what it does for us as we worship God.

We saw that the worship of God will change our lives if we would enter into worship not as an event but as a lifestyle.

We saw that we make decisions individually but that we need each other.

Walking with God is easier when we do not journey alone but with our brothers and sisters in the Lord.

This morning, we are taking the time to look at living in the presence of God.

We make choices everyday about everything in our lives, but no decision is as important as the choice to have God active or inactive in your life.

The theme of the Old Testament book of Deuteronomy is choice.

Moses, as well as his successor Joshua insisted The Nation of Israel had an obligation to choose who they would follow. Jehovah God, or following other gods that would take them away from the true God.

We have the same mandate for our lives today- We are to choose who we will follow, to be obedient to God or not. Choices!

The constant danger for Israel was to allow something else to become the center of their lives and not God.

Deuteronomy 30:11-20 Read from Bible.

Choice

Decision not procrastination

Knowing God’s word so you can be educated with what He has already said to us.

Getting on track and staying on track- even in those hard times.

The Bible is full of reverences of people who encountered God.

Some were looking for God and some were not even thinking about God but because of His grace and His mercy He shows up and offers a chance for us to respond to Him.

Moses, at the tent of meeting and on the mountaintop of God encountered God and scripture says that the glory of God was all over him. (It was evident that he had spent time with God)

Isaiah encountered God in a vision and was confronted with his sin and the sin of mankind needing a savior. (Time with God will reveal our shortcomings and His greatness)

Apostle Paul encountered Jesus on the road to Damascus while persecuting believers and his life was changed forever. (Time with God will reveal our need for Him)

Every time we talk about living in God’s presence, most think of trying to be holy, getting rid of bad things in your life, and not having fun anymore, only doing what the Lord wants like it is a punishment.

Most of that is true- we should desire that God would get rid of things in our life that are bad for us.

Being holy is not a bad thing, is not punishment, it is desiring that God would actively be present in your life and your life would reflect the decision that you made to follow Him. It is not a punishment but a blessing as we do his will in our life.

His presence is what we need in our lives or we cannot even begin to do His will.

God has been touching people lives the last few weeks, the question becomes, are you going to allow him to complete what He desires for our lives?

Illustration (SermonCentral)

There is a story of an old Scottish women who went from home to home selling thread, buttons, and shoestrings. When she came to an unmarked crossroad, she would toss a stick into the air and go in the direction the stick pointed when it landed. One day however, she was seen tossing the stick up several times. Why do you toss the stick more than once? Someone asked. Because it keeps pointing to the left, and I want to go to the right. She kept throwing the stick until it pointed where she desired to go.

Decision- your decision is key to your future! Repeat.

Verse 15- “See, I have set before you this day”

Faith is always today.

Yesterday’s faith will not see you through today- today’s faith will. Not yesterday, not tomorrow, but now… today.

You have heard the term “free will’- it means that God gives every human being the opportunity to make choices that will affect their destiny.

Because of free will, others can be hurt by other people’s bad decisions.

It does not mean that God didn’t redeem mankind, He has already done that. It means every human being decides if they will accept what Jesus has done.

It does not mean that they can do anything that they want- yes, if they choose to be out of the perimeter of God grace and mercy, no, if they want to be within his perimeter of grace.

According to God’s laws of grace, we cannot make ourselves righteous. We are only righteous by what Christ has done for us.