Message 3: Seek His Face
2nd Chronicles 7:14
We are studying this portion of scripture that, when applied, will bring about great victory in your life.
· Some need relationships restored
· Others need spiritual healing
· Maybe some here need salvation
· While others need healing
While you have to have the right attitude in living your victorious Christian life, God’s word provides us with the things we must do to achieve our goals.
1. Humble ourselves – get rid of pride and turn in your resignation
2. Pray – not just “cute” prayers but those were you have to get alone and put everything you have into the prayer.
Today we talk about the third element of victory.
Read 2nd Chronicles 7:14
Seek His Face – Seeking out God and understanding His will for our lives.
Whatever we “seek” first, represents what has authority in our lives. WHO and WHAT will control the decision-making process in our daily walk.
Before we jump into the proper way to “seek His face”, let’s first talk about the things that have been causing us to make bad choices in our lives.
- Why do I continue to give in to temptation?
- Why does it seem that I continue to make bad decisions?
- Why do I not know what God wants me to do with my life?
You have to understand, the world presents us with a number of options when it comes to answering the question of “who” and “what” will be our authority.
While the world has been presenting these options, we have bought into them and have proclaimed these as a way of life.
When it comes to whom we seek first – Some of us fall into the trap of:
1. Rationalism (reasoning)
These people say their minds are the ultimate foundation for life’s choices.
I have my own mind and I can make my own decisions.
My mind is in place to tell me what I am to do.
The job of your mind:
· To tell your legs when to take a step
· To tell your hand it is sitting on a hot stove
· To tell your eyes to look and focus
But your mind is not equipped to be the authority for your decision making process.
Two reasons why your mind is not qualified for this particular job:
a. Your mind is finite – it is subject to limitations.
Nobody knows everything (even though some act like it). There are lots of things we don’t even suspect much less know.
Before you can make decisions with your mind, it must be a mind that knows all things or you will end up in trouble.
*That is why we end up in trouble after thinking we had made a good decision. We have no way of knowing what is around the curve. That’s one reason why our minds cannot be the ultimate source of our decision making process. We must seek a higher authority.
Another reason on why you cannot use your mind for reasoning:
b. Your mind is sinful – You cannot depend on your mind to give you accurate information.
You prove that everyday when you give into temptation
· Someone does you wrong – your mind tells you to get back at them and double it
· Someone hits you – your mind says to hit them back
· Someone goes off on you – your mind tells you to fire back
The mind is unstable – you cannot use it as your authority. For some, that is why you are in the trouble you are in today. You have allowed your mind to dictate how you are going to live.
While some depend on their minds, others depend on their own:
2. Feelings – They are moved only by emotions
Why is this a bad thing?
Your emotions are unreliable because they change regularly.
In fact, for some, emotions change from moment to moment.
· When things are up – we are up
· When things are down – we are down
But if it is something that God wants His people to do, shouldn’t it affect all of us in the same way?
We are people who get emotionally attached to things. Things that we shouldn’t get attached to. And once we are attached, it’s hard to pull away.
- We get attached
- We get emotion involved
- We fall in love
- We are stuck
So we already see that we cannot allow our emotions to be our authority in our decision making process.
3. Conscience – relying on moral instincts, their senses of right and wrong.
You know, this sounds good on the surface but on the surface only.
Your conscience can only reflect what it has been fed.
If your conscience has been getting wrong information, you could be feeling right about something that is wrong. Or wrong about something that is right.
You could be operating on a moral instinct that is not altogether accurate.
That’s why you have some Christians who feel that it is okay:
· To have a beer every once in awhile – they have no problem taking part in activities where alcohol is involved
· To go to nightclubs so they can “enjoy the music only”
· To get into a relationship with a non-believer because their great grandfather was a preacher
Basing your decisions on wrong information.
· My mom did it that way
· My Dad was a good man and he didn’t mind taking a drink
· I was raised saying this or that was okay…
But for some, you were fed wrong information and your conscience is reacting to that information.
Titus 1:15 tell us:
”To the pure, all things look pure but to those who are defiled and unbelieving, nothing is pure. But both their mind and conscience are defiled.”
If we choose reason, emotion, or conscience as our source of ultimate authority, we’re in trouble, because they are all defective.
There is only one source of authority on which the decisions of life should rest and that is the Word of God.
This Word is what God uses to unveil information about Him.
The revelation of God’s word is our way of getting to know about God and what He decides to reveal to us.
God is so far outside of and above our realm of functioning that if we are left to those things we talked about earlier, we are going to fall really short.
Whatever we came up with is going to be something other than the God of scripture.
To seek God, we have to go to the source that provides the only way to see Him. His Word!
It’s through His word that He reveals himself to us.
Why is this important?
Isaiah 55:8.9 – God speaking
“My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.”
God says two very important things in this scripture:
1. I am different from you
We have to realize that God is not in the place for us to take Him and try to fit Him into our daily lives.
That box is not big enough for God.
We can’t decide on what we are going to do and then pray that God will bless it – that’s putting him in our box.
We must learn how God works and then adjust our lives to fit what He is already doing.
2. I am higher than you
Have you ever created the sea?
Have you ever created the air your breath?
Have you ever decided to create an animal?
Have you flung stars into space?
Then you are not on the same level as God.
Illus.
A child trying to tell parents what to do
What children try to do with their mom and dads, we try to do with God.
We try to advise Him on how to be God.
God is so much higher than us that He must reveal Himself to us – He does this through His scriptures.
Notice:
God’s Word is Personal –
Isaiah 55:11
“So shall my word be which goes forth from My mouth…”
When you open your Bible, you are not just engaging in academic study. You are really trying to understand a Person.
When you look into the Word – you see God.
God’s Word is Purposeful -
Isaiah 55:11 finishes by saying,
“My word shall not return to me empty (void) without accomplishing what I desire.”
God’s word acts. It does things in our lives that God purposes shall be done. Every word that comes from God’s mouth is infused with purpose.
If you are going to seek His Face, you can only see Him in His Word.
His Word will:
Direct thy paths
Give you answers to life’s toughest questions
Direct you in the ways that you should go
Help you stand when others try to bring you down
Save you from sin and a devil’s hell
Encourage you when you are weak
If we are going to have true victory in our lives:
We must humble ourselves
We must pray – with everything we’ve got
But we must not forsake the reading of God’s Word.
When we read His word - we are seeking the very face of God
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You are struggling now with the decisions that you have made based on:
· Your Reasoning
· Your Feelings
· Your Conscience
Why not start today by living your life based on the Word of God?
Find where God is working and join Him.
Where God is, that’s where you will find victory.
