Running from God is a learned behavior. As we get older our understanding of God is altered from a God who is present with us, pursuing us, to a God who is distant —- a God who only shows up on Sunday mornings at church. Instead of a God who is running after us, trying to get our attention, we begin to run after God, trying to get God’s attention.
Psalm 139 is pretty clear. We don’t need to run after God’s attention — we already have it. In verse 7 David laments:
Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from you presence?
God is present with us. But God is more than present with us, He KNOWS us. He doesn’t follow alongside of us, He follows inside of us. We don’t have to attend church to find God. We don’t have to make sure our life is clear of any sin to find God. God has found us regardless of our situation, regardless of our condition. We can be lost, dizzied by our own spiritual vertigo, but God is present with us, luring us back to Himself. We may turn our backs on god, but God is always facing us.
GOD RULES AND OVERRULES
“If this counsel or this work be of man, it will come to nought: but if it be if God, ye cannot overthrow it; lest haply ye be found even to fight against God.” (Acts 5:38-39)
If in the heart of man there is some evil device and plan which God does not purpose to ultimately use and work into good, then He restrains it from happening, and man becomes frustrated because his plans have failed again. Why spend a lifetime fighting against God, when in the end it will be man, and not God, that is defeated? But, if we align ourselves willingly and joyfully with His will, then we are one with the power that never faileth.
“The Lord breaks the plans of the pagans,
And frustrates mere human designs; –
But the plans of the Lord last for ever,
The designs of His heart for all times,”
(Psalm 33:10-11, Ferrar Fenton trans.)
“For the ways of a man are before the eyes of the Lord, and He pondereth all His goings.” (Prov.5:21). And that in the mouth of two witnesses a thing might be confirmed, we add Hebrews 4:13, “all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.”
There are no “cover-ups” that He cannot see through. No masquerades that He cannot discern the real state underneath. It is all naked before Him. Darkness and light are both alike unto Him. “A man’s mind plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps and makes them sure.” (Prov. 16:9). How many times have we planned it all out in our mind, only to discover when it is time to carry out those plans, the whole course of direction has been changed. God rules and overrules, and thus “the steps of a man are ordered by the Lord.” (Ps. 37:23). “The lot is cast into the lap, but the decision is wholly of the Lord – even the events that seem accidental are really ordered by Him.” (Prov. 16:33).