Experiencing God's Presence #50

I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit in you.

Ezekiel 36:26

We often approach God with a sense of futility. With motives as mixed as ours, how can we expect Him to give us the blessings promised to the wholehearted? With faith as weak as ours, how can we expect Him to reward us with answers? With tempers or cravings or agendas as strong as ours, how can we expect Him to hear us without our sins getting in the way? The standards seem so high for that flourishing, superspiritual, ask-and-receive relationship experienced by so many great saints. We never seem to measure up, and we know it.

The greatest blessing of the gospel of grace is that God gives us all we need for life and godliness. If conditions are required of us to receive from Him—like faith or desire, for example—He fills in where our hearts are lacking. In the verse above, God spoke through Ezekiel to people who were in exile. They would need to seek God in order to be restored, but they weren’t in a seeking mood. That’s okay—God was going to give them a heart to seek Him and know Him. Their restoration was conditional, but God would give them the means to meet the condition. Ultimately, their only requirement was to not rebel against what He was doing in them and with them.

Paul wrote that God is at work in us shaping our desires and our actions (Philippians 2:13). He is not only the intended end of our search, He is the means to the end. Yes, our approach to Him would be futile—if we were approaching Him with our own resources, our self-produced faith, our own stirred-up desires, and so on. But we aren’t. We approach Him with a heart that He has given us. And that heart is designed to measure up.

Father, I need that kind of heart—the kind You give. Fill me with Your desires, Your faith, and anything else that pleases You.

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