Escape from Gilligans Island: God Inhabits

We strug­gle with ways to max­i­mize our rela­tion­ship with God. When we wor­ship God from afar we will not truly under­stand who God is. By fol­low­ing God from afar we will find our­selves stranded. We need to under­stand that God desires to have a very per­sonal and inti­mate rela­tion­ship with us. When we work on that rela­tion­ship, we can stay off of Gilligan’s Island. That was the basic mes­sage that Pastor Jeff preached to us Sunday.

First a quick snap­shot of the ser­mon as typed out on my iPhone dur­ing the ser­vice. You would be bet­ter off hear­ing it. If you are in Omaha, be sure to visit Flatland oth­er­wise, visit their web­site and down­load the podcast.

Rev. 3:16 [show]Revelation 3:16 [16]So, because you are luke­warm, and nei­ther hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. (ESV)
— Christ stands at the door and knocks. He comes in but like an empty house we need to fur­nish the home — we need to build our rela­tion­ship with Him.

Exodus 40:34 [show]Exodus 40:34 [34]Then the cloud cov­ered the tent of meet­ing, and the glory of the LORD filled the taber­na­cle. (ESV)

God has wanted to inhabit mankind from the begin­ning In Eden man walked with God, saw Him and talked with Him face to face. Sin changed that.

God inhab­its places that are holy. In the Old Testament, God inhab­ited the tabernacle/temple. But to access God one had to go through all kind of rit­ual and ulti­mately only the high priest could actu­ally enter into God’s pres­ence. God changed all that through Christ. He ripped the veil that pre­vented peo­ple from enter­ing the Holy of Holies

Gal 2:20 [show]Galatians 2:20 [20]I have been cru­ci­fied with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave him­self for me. (ESV)

God wants us to pur­sue Him. We are on a jour­ney to dis­cover who He is. He is right there with us.

1 Cor 6:19 [show]1 Corinthians 6:19 [19]Or do you not know that your body is a tem­ple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, (ESV)
tem­ple we are for God to inhabit.

Outer court , holy place, holy of holies  God inhab­its the holy of holies.

Don’t set­tle for sec­ond place — pur­sue God just like Jason Lezak pur­sued the Olympic gold medal in the 4 x 100m med­ley relay, swim­ming his heart out, beat­ing his per­sonal best time for the 100m by a large margin.

So how do we max­i­mize our rela­tion­ship with God?

1. Hunger after God Matt 5:6 [show]Matthew 5:6 [6]“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for right­eous­ness, for they shall be sat­is­fied. (ESV)
   
2. Persevere through hard times James 1:4 [show]James 1:4 [4]And let stead­fast­ness have its full effect, that you may be per­fect and com­plete, lack­ing in noth­ing. (ESV)
   
3. Humble your­self to God’s truth James 1:21–22 [show]James 1:21–22 [21]Therefore put away all filth­i­ness and ram­pant wicked­ness and receive with meek­ness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. [22]But be doers of the word, and not hear­ers only, deceiv­ing your­selves. (ESV)
   
4. Determine to never give up. Hebrews 12:1–2 [show]Hebrews 12:1–2 Therefore, since we are sur­rounded by so great a cloud of wit­nesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, [2]looking to Jesus, the founder and per­fecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despis­ing the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. (ESV)
   

I was chal­lenge by Pastor Jeff in sev­eral ways but I think the word “pur­sue” is what stands out to me the most. We can not sit back idle and expect our rela­tion­ship with God to grow and mature. Our rela­tion­ship is just like my tomato plants sit­ting out on the patio. If I don’t actively water them, make sure they are bug free, are in the sun, and have proper fer­til­izer, they will die. The rain may come occa­sion­ally to keep them barely alive and rather wimpy tomatos if any but if I tend to them actively, I will get nice tomatos.

I am sit­ting here look­ing at the four points above: hunger, per­se­vere, hum­ble, never give up! They seem to be burn­ing them­selves into my brain and my heart. I need to never be sat­is­fied with where I am in my rela­tion­ship with God but hunger for even more. Even when I am strug­gling, I will per­se­vere in fol­low­ing God. I need to bow to God’s truth and obey His ways out of my love for Him and desire to serve Him. I will never give up in this pur­suit, no mat­ter what life throws at me for I know He waits for me at the fin­ish line even as He runs along side me, cheer­ing me along, and pro­vid­ing help and com­fort that I may con­tinue running.