Jan 17 — Reverence of Daily Relationship

Isaiah 58:2a — Yet they seek Me daily, ...

Today we move from the righteousness theme to reverence.  It’s not that righteousness isn’t about revering God but we will now examine the ways we approach our relationship with Him.  The link between righteousness and reverence will be considered in two days.  Today the perspective shifts to focus on how we live our relationship with God.  We considered righteousness first because God’s focus in the Isaiah 58 fast was in bringing out attention to treating each other correctly in honouring Him.  Now we must think about how we treat God.

I like having good habits.  Good habits help me to do what I need to do with less thought and effort.  Such habits can include bathing/showering, brushing teeth, doing laundry, going to the gym, worship and prayer.  Good habits can also trip me up in my relationship with God because I do it with “less thought and effort.”  At this point, I’m just going through the motions.  I’ve sung the song during worship, but as much as my mouth was moving and singing the words, my thoughts were elsewhere.  My singing; my prayer; my offering: all can be done without actually investing myself in approaching God.  In which case, I never approached Him at all.  I just showed up with my body but left the rest of me behind.

I can also treat my daily approach to God as duty.  Somehow it’s simply my end of the deal in seeking Him daily … and, because I have considered it so, God owes me for showing up.  I’m doing my job and He has to pay me.  Sure, there are days when it’s a complete joy to approach the Lord.  There are times when devotion or desperation draw me to His presence.  However, when it becomes duty/work/obligation/tradition, then my heart can expect things from God.  My relationship with God is just that: a personal relationship.  He’s fully invested in that relationship and loves me unconditionally; I need to be fully invested in this relationship also without expectation that He will do something for me.  A daily relationship with God always pays off, but I can’t look for the payoff or I’m just using the relationship … and, God’s not naive.

Lord, forgive me where I’ve just gone through the motions.  Forgive me where I’ve daily approached You because I want something from meeting with You instead of wanting to deepen my relationship with You.  I’ve been selfish in our relationship and I repent.  I’ve been lazy in our relationship and I repent.  I look forward to daily approaching You with a heart of worship.  Let all the benefits of our relationship simply be fringe benefits because I am focussed on loving You.

[Also meditate on: Ps. 40:6-8, 51:14-17; Is. 29:13; Acts 2:46-47; Rom. 4:1-4; Titus 3:4-8]