God rushes in!

This morning I read a story in Numbers 21:4-9.

It's a story about Moses and about the children of Israel.

In this story, the Israelites have been journeying through the wilderness and they began to speak bitterly against the Lord. God responded by sending fiery (aka poisonous) serpents among them to punish them for their sin.

In their distress, the children of Israel humbled themselves and cried out to God for mercy. And God, because He is loving kindness, had mercy upon his rebellious children.

God told Moses to raise a serpent of bronze upon a pole in the center of the camp, so that any who had been bitten might look upon it and be healed.

Do you suppose that any of those who lay dieing refused to turn their faces towards the bronze serpent?

I cannot imagine that any did.

Sooo....

What if I told you that God is always with you?

What if I told that God is always reaching for you with outstretched arms?

What if I told you the God yearns for you to respond to His holy presence?

Sometimes I have difficulties believing this and then I read a story like the one I've just shared and I remember.

I remember that God is always with me, that His arms are out stretched, and that He yearns for me to respond to His holy presence.

What's stopping you from turning your face towards God?

What's stopping you from running headlong into His loving arms?

Me?

I'm prideful.

I'm fat with laziness.

I'm sometimes afraid.

I am even overwhelmed by my own unworthiness.

But here's the amazing part......

As lazy, as fat, and as sinful as I truly am, all I have to do is look in God's direction and He comes rushing to me. I get to live the Number's story and the Prodigal parable, over and over in my life.

I glance, and God rushes in! I glance and God rushes in!

God is good

Selah...

God is good!