He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.
Hebrews 11:6, ‘And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him’.
We believe there is a God, when we come to God. We also need to believe that our God is a rewarder of those who diligently or earnestly seek Him. This is faith. Are we diligently or earnestly seeking God? God wants us to experience the complete blessedness of our spiritual lives! God wants to reward us, as God is more eager to give us, what He had promised for us.
Matthew 6:33, ‘But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.’
Let us all, wholeheartedly seek God. God is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.
Jeremiah 29:13, ‘You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart.’
Seeking Him diligently is to seek Him with all our heart.
V11, ‘For I know the plans that I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope.’
God has a specific plan for our lives. Let us seek Him diligently. Let us find Him and search for Him with all our heart, then God will fulfill His plan and His will for our lives.
Br. Zac says, ‘Suppose we lose a ten paise in the grass at night, how long will you search for it? After some time of searching, we will stop looking for it, because we consider the value of this 10paise is very less. Suppose if we misplaced a bundle of ten thousand rupees, somewhere, then how long will you search for it? We will be searching for them everywhere until we find them. Let us examine ourselves, do we search eagerly for our Lord in the same way? How eagerly do we seek the Lord for the victory over sin? How earnestly, do we seek to be filled with the Holy Spirit’. God is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. Let us press on, to reach that perfection, the goal that God kept before us! We should not have a stagnant Christian life!
A.W. Tozer said, ‘The complacency is the deadly enemy of spiritual progress. The contended soul is the stagnant soul.’
The self-satisfaction is the deadly enemy of our spiritual progress! Never be satisfied by our spiritual state! Always be a diligent and earnest seeker of God, as He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him! We need to hear to the voice of the Holy Spirit, as in Revelation 4:1, we see that god is calling us to come up! Come up to the higher level!
Deuteronomy 2:1-3, ‘“Then we turned and set out for the wilderness by the way to the Red Sea, as the Lord spoke to me, and circled Mount Seir for many days. 2 And the Lord spoke to me, saying, 3 ‘You have circled this mountain long enough. Now turn north,’
God says, ‘You have circled this mountain long enough, now turn north!’ The Israelites were circling round and round the Mount Seir for many days! There is no progress in their lives! The movement is there, but there is no progress! This was not God’s plan or God’s will for the Israelites! God’s plan for the Israelites was to go and possess the promised land! In our lives, we also have the movement – ‘we come to the Church meetings, praying in the Church, sharing the Bible verse, singing the song, giving messages to the Churches’ – all are well and good! God is not happy if we don’t have any spiritual progress in our Christian lives! We are getting defeated by the same sins – anger, uncontrolled tongue, justifying nature, the complaining spirit’ – These same sins are making us circling around the mountain and there is no spiritual progress at all! God’s will for us is to be overcomers. We need to go forward and possess the promised land! Let us diligently and earnestly seek the Lord. God is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.
Psalms 42:1, 2, ‘As the deer pants for the water brooks, So my soul pants for You, O God. 2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God; When shall I come and appear before God?
This is how we need to seek God. Seeking for the presence of God. As the deer pants for the water brooks, let us seek for the living God only.
Psalms 27:4, ‘One thing I have asked from the Lord, that I shall seek: That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the Lord And to meditate in His temple.’
The longing for the Lord and the desire to dwell in the house of the Lord, all our days and to behold the beauty of the Lord and to meditate – this should be our only desire in our lives!
Luke 18:35 – 42, ‘As Jesus was approaching Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the road begging. 36 Now hearing a crowd going by, he began to inquire what this was. 37 They told him that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. 38 And he called out, saying, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” 39 Those who led the way were sternly telling him to be quiet; but he kept crying out all the more, “Son of David, have mercy on me!” 40 And Jesus stopped and commanded that he be brought to Him; and when he came near, He questioned him, 41 “What do you want Me to do for you?” And he said, “Lord, I want to regain my sight!” 42 And Jesus said to him, “Receive your sight; your faith has made you well.”’
When the people around this blind man were asking him to quiet, he was crying out all the more, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’ The blindness was totally disturbing him and it was a necessity for him to be healed. He needs to be cured. Let us seek God like him, not as a man looking for a lost ten paise coin! If we are serious in our Christian lives, we will seek the Lord earnestly and diligently!
Psalms 34:10, ‘The young lions do lack and suffer hunger; But they who seek the Lord shall not be in want of any good thing.’
This is the promise of God. Those who seek the Lord, will not lack any good thing! Why we are lacking many good things? Because we are not seeking the Lord, diligently. He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. In the forest, the lions may suffer hunger but His promise to His children, who seek Him diligently, is that, they will not lack any good thing!
Luke 11:6-10, ‘for a friend of mine has come to me from a journey, and I have nothing to set before him’; 7 and from inside he answers and says, ‘Do not bother me; the door has already been shut and my children and I are in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything.’ 8 I tell you, even though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his persistence he will get up and give him as much as he needs.
9 “So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you’.
God wants us to seek Him persistently. To seek to be filled with the Holy Spirit, to be filled with good things in our Christian lives. God is more eager to give us, what He has promised us! Let us have this faith in us.
When Apostle Paul is considering the earthly matters in his life, he said, he learnt to be content. When he is considering his spiritual matter, he is not content. He says, ‘I am pressing on towards that goal’. Let us also never get satisfied with our spiritual state. Never be content in ourselves. Let us always press on! We should never be satisfied with our spiritual growth. In Ezekiel 47, we see the beautiful picture of, the spiritual levels we are encouraged to follow, the first step being the water coming at ankle’s depth – shows our shallow spiritual life – this is not the Christian life God wants from us! God wants us to go further! Then we can reach the second stage – water level is coming to knee depth – this is not the Christian life God wants from us! God wants us to go further! Then we can reach the third stage – water level is coming to loins depth – this is not the Christian life God wants from us! God wants us to go further! Then we can reach the fourth stage – water level is too deep, where we cannot walk, but we have to swim! This is the fulness of the spirit. This is where the rivers of living water flows from within us! This stage is God’s perfect will for us! Our focus is to experience this 4th level of Christian life! We should always listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit to come up higher! If we seek Him, God will help us until we reach ‘the rivers of living water’ within ourselves. This is the abundant life; God wants from our lives.
1 Chronicles 22:19, ‘Now set your heart and your soul to seek the Lord your God;’
We need to seek the Lord with all our heart!
Colossians 3:1,2, ‘Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.’
Holy Spirit says, ‘If you are raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God’. Seek God, not the earthly things. God is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.
Hosea 10:12, ‘For it is time to seek the Lord Until He comes to rain righteousness on you’
It is the time to seek and search the Lord diligently, until He rains the righteousness on us! Let us have faith in our hearts.
Hebrews 11:6, ‘And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him’.
Praise God.
