Can God Really Help You?

I have been reflecting recently on a journey I went on with God a few years ago.

It is the matter of us ‘dwelling’ or ‘abiding’ in and with Him as opposed to ‘visiting’ or ’holidaying’ with Him. You see when we visit or holiday somewhere no matter how much we enjoy it, there is a huge difference between that and living or abiding there. We don’t have any rights or legal standing to abide there for any length of time, when the vacation is over it’s over! Time to go home, no matter how great a holiday is, it is good to get back to our place of abode - it is where we know where everything is, where we are at home with all our stuff, whether that is a small studio, a room in our parents’ house or our dream home. What God was showing me was that I was inclined to ‘visit’ with Him a bit!

But what He wanted from our relationship was ABIDING.

Everything He has for us is in the place of dwelling with Him, with all the privileges and entitlements He has given us because of who He is, not because of our performance or how good or bad we are. He didn’t want me staying for a while, getting a fix then going out from Him and His presence and becoming contaminated with all the things that living and abiding outside Him can bring. Things like fear, insecurity, worry, strife etc. God knows that if I am making my home anywhere except in Him, I am prone to wander from all the things that are mine and available to me, all that He shows me when I am abiding in Him. As we go deeper in God He expands our capacity for understanding, we cannot enter into the profound truths and deep things of God until we relinquish control, and this constant visiting with Him is us wanting to control things, you see what God was trying to get me to understand was that the more I got to know Him the more I will trust Him and then I will want to abide with Him more and more and make it a priority always.

I realised that I had been meeting God for little visits and wondering why I had no power in my life, no consistency to apply what I had been learning from Him to my everyday circumstances. I discovered that I had to learn to dwell with God and that I had to hear from Him ‘intravenously’, do you understand what I mean by that? I needed to hear directly from Him – sometimes we get fed from other people’s revelation about God but we must get our own revelation and relationship with Him to where He becomes our very best friend and this can only be embarked upon by spending time with Him ALONE.

I needed to get away to the secret place with Him on my own, to spend time getting to know all the promises He had for my life, and I discovered that I loved it! Time with God, amazing time, just hanging out with Him, at his place! The most secure place in the world or outside it! I would encourage you to take the time to do this, whether just like me you have been neglecting dwelling with God in pursuit of other things that you think are more important or perhaps this is a new concept for you, perhaps you’ve never discovered this kind of relationship with God exists. I encourage you to find the secret place with Jesus-go for it!

Discover or re discover the wonder of spending time with God. There is no such thing as quality or quantity time with God, there is just TIME.

When I pulled away with Him I found that the words of this amazing psalm were true and I discovered that when I dwell with him His promises are true, just look at some of them in psalm 91:

'THEN He will deliver me from the snare of the fowler’,

'THEN He will cover me with His pinions and under His wings shall I trust and find refuge, His truth and His faithfulness are a shield and a buckler’. ..’

'BECAUSE I have made the Lord my refuge, and the Most High my DWELLING place there shall no evil befall me... He will give His angels charge over me...'

'Because I have set my love upon Him, therefore He will deliver me... I will call upon Him and He will answer me He will be with me in trouble, He will deliver me and honour me’.

This is powerful! Where are you dwelling? If you are inclined to visit with God instead of dwelling with Him, I would challenge you today to answer the following questions. Where are you dwelling that’s better? If you don’t know Him intimately today who do you have that’s better?

Psalm 91: He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall remain stable and fixed under the shadow of the Almighty...

Your in Christ

Eithne Glynn-Finnegan