Draw near to God, and He will draw near to You - Part 1

James 4:1-10 What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”? But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.

Pastor Kyle, continuing through his Sermon series, told us that he remembered Pastor Rick Warren said that You are as close to God as you want to be; meaning that things change from passive to active. Its easy to think that faith goes through seasons of life; believing that if going through a dry season of life, then it will be dry no matter what. There are, of course, things in our life that we have no control over and these events of life affect our faith. We, for example, are moral and morality naturally affects every all of us. The season of life that we are going through affects us, but doesn't dictate our life. When life gives us lemons, then we need to make lemonade.

Psalm 106:13-15 “They soon forgot His works; they did not wait for His counsel, but lusted exceedingly in the wilderness, and tested God in the desert. And He gave them their request, but sent leanness into their soul.”

The “fall of man”, by man, caused the entry of sin into the world, not God. Pastor Kyle  that people believing that the Bible and God are myths or Fairy Tales are struggling with Christianity or stopping believing completely because of pain; pulling away from God and Savior that they do not know and pursuing the things of this world for comfort. They lack the power of God’s presence because they cannot experience what they do not know, so they turn to the passions within. Following the godless pursuit of happiness, two false beliefs prevent them from drawing near to God and rob us of His power. (1) The trap of the comparison game, saying: “If my life looked more like theirs, I would be happier.” When we play the comparison game, its really the “Blame” game and nobody wins, because it is not of God and play into the cultures lies. The grass may look greener on the other side of the fence, but we have to remember that wherever the grass is greener, the water bill is higher. (2) More and Amazing stuff, saying: “I know that more and better stuff won’t make me happier, but it sure fells like a little bit more would go a long way. The motive is covetous lusts and prideful passions that lack true fulfillment and contentment. Pursuit of radical excitement and amazing mountaintop experiences are not living nor what life is all about. There is nothing wrong with desiring the things of God, anything outside of Christ is and ungodly lust, misguided passions and spiritual adultery with another god, where there is no lasting satisfaction.  

We'll continue Pastor Kyle message on "Drawing Near to God" tomorrow.

In Christ, Brian